Michelle Mone interview: Michael Gove says he cooperated with PPE MedPro probe as peer claims ‘they all knew’

Michael Gove has revealed he has cooperated with the National Crime Agency investigation into PPE MedPro, the firm embroiled in the Michelle Mone scandal.

The Cabinet minister, who was chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster when the pandemic struck, was name-checked by Baroness Mone in her first major broadcast interview in recent months.

The interview, on the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme, saw Baroness Mone admit she did not tell the truth about her links to the PPE firm – while insisting that she and her husband have “no case to answer”. The pair admitted that the £60 million profit from the £200 million contract of taxpayers’ money has been paid into a family trust.

Baroness Mone, who was made a peer by David Cameron in 2015, did not declare her links to PPE MedPro on the House of Lords register of interests, as is required, and her legal team threatened to sue journalists for reporting on the story. In November 2021, her lawyer said: “For the avoidance of any doubt, Baroness Mone did not declare any interest as she did not benefit financially and was not connected to PPE Medpro in any capacity.”

The company is currently being investigated by the NCA, while the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has since issued breach of contract proceedings over a 2020 deal on the supply of gowns. Millions of gowns supplied by the company were never used by health services and the DHSC is still seeking to claw back some of the money. Baroness Mone and her husband insist the gowns were supplied in accordance with the contract.

Baroness Mone said she contacted Gove at the start of the pandemic following a “call to arms for all lords, baronesses, MPs, senior civil servants, to help, because they needed massive quantities of PPE”. “I just said, ‘We can help, and we want to help.’ And he was like, ‘Oh my goodness, this is amazing’,” she added. 

Gove today confirmed that he had cooperated with the NCA investigation. In a Q&A after a speech on housebuilding, the now-Housing Secretary said: “With respect to fairness, as I’m sure you know, there is a National Crime Agency inquiry going on. I’ve cooperated with that inquiry because I want to ensure that it reaches its conclusion quickly, that justice can be served.

“And if there are further questions to ask about PPE procurement, and I believe the government has a strong record, then I’m more than happy to do so with the Covid inquiry.” He added: “I hope that inquiry results in a case being brought”.

Labour’s Nick Thomas-Symonds has called on Gove to answer questions about the PPE contract in Parliament. He wrote: “It will of course be for the legal matters to take their course, but events so far expose a shocking recklessness by the Conservative Government with regard to public money, and a sorry tale of incompetence in relation to the so-called ‘VIP Lane’ for procurement during the pandemic.”

He also wrote to Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden urging him to launch an investigation into the awarding of contracts to PPE MedPro and Baroness Mone. The peer has claimed that the government knew all about her involvement from the beginning.

After the Prime Minister commented that he was taking these matters “incredibly seriously”, she tweeted: “What is Rishi Sunak talking about? I was honest with the Cabinet Office, the government and the NHS in my dealings with them. They all knew about my involvement from the very beginning."

A spokesman for Baroness Mone has said there are more than 1,000 individual pieces of correspondence between her, the Cabinet Office, DHSC and Michael Gove. He said: "Whilst Baroness Mone has now admitted she made a mistake in her dealings with the media, the government were all aware of her involvement from the very beginning. Michelle Mone and Doug Barrowman dispute the claims by DHSC that their product was not to specification, and intend to clear their name."

Ralph Blackburn is NationalWorld’s politics editor based in Westminster, where he gets special access to Parliament, MPs and government briefings. If you liked this article you can follow Ralph on X (Twitter) here and sign up to his free weekly newsletter Politics Uncovered, which brings you the latest analysis and gossip from Westminster every Sunday morning.