Bra tycoon Michelle Mone admits lying about £60m profits from Covid contracts — but insists it’s ‘no crime’
BRAZEN bra millionaire Michelle Mone yesterday admitted lying about the huge profits she could rake in from a controversial Covid contract — but insisted it was no crime.
The tycoon and Tory peer revealed that she stands to benefit from £60million gained via a lucrative PPE deal with the Government.
Baroness Mone, who made her name through the Ultimo lingerie line, also conceded she made an “error” by denying her links to PPE firm Medpro.
She helped the company win contracts worth £200million to supply equipment to the NHS.
Mone, 52, repeatedly denied she stood to gain anything.
But she admitted to the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg that “of course” she may get the money as she is a beneficiary of financial trusts belonging to billionaire husband Doug Barrowman, 58, which hold around £60million in profits.
Mone explained: “If one day, God forbid, my husband passes away before me, then I am a beneficiary, as well as his children and my children.”
But she hit back when asked if she had “done wrong” by lying to the Press and thereby the public.
She insisted: “That’s not a crime. Saying to the Press I’m not involved to protect my family, can I just make this clear — it’s not a crime.”
Denying she tried to fool anyone over the deal, she added: “I did make an error in saying to the Press that I wasn’t involved.
“Hindsight is a wonderful thing. I wasn’t trying to pull the wool over anyone’s eyes, and I regret and I’m sorry for not saying straight out, ‘Yes, I am involved’.”
PPE Medpro is being sued by the Department of Health for £122million over medical gowns said to be unfit for purpose.
The company is also being probed by the National Crime Agency over fraud allegations.
Last week, the couple used a video paid for by PPE Medpro to insist they did nothing wrong.
Mone — currently on a leave of absence from Parliament — also claimed they had been made “scapegoats” for the Government’s failings during the pandemic.
But Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting hit out at people “who saw the pandemic as an opportunity to make a quick buck at someone else’s expense”.
