Assets controlled by Michelle Mone and her husband worth about £75m have been frozen or restrained under a court order obtained by the Crown Prosecution Service.
PPE Medpro, a company led by Mone’s husband, Doug Barrowman, is under investigation by the National Crime Agency over government contracts awarded during the pandemic for allegedly faulty personal protective equipment.
It was awarded contracts worth more than £200m to supply PPE to the NHS through a “VIP lane”. The firm is also being sued by the Department of Health and Social Care.
While Mone had previously complained about her assets being frozen – and likened her treatment to that meted out to the Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar – the couple have now confirmed they have agreed to restrictions being placed over a range of assets.
This includes a six-bedroom townhouse in London’s Belgravia and a country estate on the Isle of Man. Prosecutors also targeted 15 accounts at Coutts, C Hoare & Co and Goldman Sachs International, according to the Financial Times.
A spokesperson for Mone and Barrowman said: “This comes as a result of a consensual process during which negotiations took place with the CPS. It allows the wider businesses and assets of the Barrowman family to operate normally and free from any restrictions or uncertainties.
“Doug and Michelle did not contest the application and were happy to offer up these assets, which means they can begin the task of proving their innocence more quickly.”
The order, issued in December after an application by the CPS, blocks the couple from selling some of the assets and applies restrictions to others.
Mone lashed out on her account on X, formerly Twitter, after the existence of the order was reported, claiming that private and confidential matters continued to be leaked by government sources. “It shows how desperate they are to keep attacking us every week,” she added.
However, the order was welcomed by the Scottish National party MP John Nicolson as “good news and not before time”.
The couple confirmed in a statement this month they were under investigation by the NCA, while claiming they were being “hung out to dry” over the government’s failings to source personal protective equipment during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Barrowman accused the government of using the NCA “to threaten criminal proceedings” to force the couple to reach a settlement over PPE Medpro, which is being sued by the UK government for £122m plus costs for “breach of contract and unjust enrichment”.
The NCA is investigating allegations of fraud and bribery surrounding the company. Mone and Barrowman both deny the allegations.
Mone admitted last month she had lied to the media by denying her links to PPE Medpro, which made millions of pounds from a deal to supply PPE via the VIP lane after she referred it to ministers in May 2020.
On Thursday, the former Scotland secretary David Mundell said the former prime minister David Cameron, now foreign secretary, breached “proper process” when he appointed Mone to the House of Lords in 2015.
Mundell, the Conservative MP for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale, said Cameron appointed Mone without No 10 consulting the government’s Scotland Office, which is standard practice before awarding peerages to Scots.
Cameron and other Westminster Tories had been impressed by Mone when she backed the union in the Scottish independence referendum in 2014. She was already well known in Scotland through her lingerie business, Ultimo.
