It has been revealed that a firm connected to the Tory peer Michelle Mone was awarded £203 million worth of government PPE contracts during the pandemic and has dodged taxes. It has been reported that Michael Gove was approached by Lady Mone in May 2020 with an offer to supply personal protective equipment. It is under investigation by the National Crime Agency (NCA) for potential fraud already.
The company in question PPE Medpro Ltd was awarded two contracts via the government’s ‘VIP Lane’. A winding up petition has been issued by HMRC, who have refused to comment further on the matter and the petition was only issued on Thursday morning.
It has already previously been reported that Mone emailed Theodore Agnew, her fellow conservative peer, on 8th May 2020, informing him that Gove had requested her to “urgently” contact him. Mone proposed supplying large quantities of face masks to the government, telling Agnew they could be sourced through “my team in Hong Kong”.
Agnew, at the time a government cabinet minister in charge of procurement, referred Mone’s offer to civil servants who processed it through the VIP “high priority lane” for politically connected people. PPE Medpro Ltd, the company that was provided with the contracts, was not incorporated until four days after Mone approached Agnew (incorporated on 12th May 2020).
The company was given its initial contract, for £80.85 million to supply 210 million face masks, a month later.
The Department of Health and Social Care provided the second contract two weeks later, for £122m, to supply 25 million surgical gowns.
Both contracts were provided directly, without competitive tenders, under covid emergency regulations.
The surgical gowns were rejected by the DHSC which caused a dispute. The DHSC has stated that it wants to recover the money lost through a dispute resolution process. PPE Medpro has of course stated that it operated in accordance with the terms of its gowns contract and was entitled to keep the money it was paid. PPE Medpro Ltd also owes £913,019 in tax and social security due within a year. This has been revealed in the companies initial financial accounts for the year to 5th April 2021. It was claimed that the company had no assets. The company made a profit of £3.9m and was apparently owed a further £4m.
https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/12597000/filing-history
Mone has repeatedly denied being involved in PPE Medpro. Her husband is the Isle of Man-based financier Douglas Barrowman, who has also distanced himself from the company. In January this year however, the Guardian reported that leaked files appeared to indicate that Mone and Barrowman were indeed secretly involved in the PPE Medpro business. Mone’s lawyers have denied that there was any wrong doing.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/06/tory-peer-michelle-mone-involved-ppe-medpro-government-contracts.
Yet again it appears to be another example of how the ruling class benefit and profit from our misery and death and no doubt these particular parasites will get away with it, the system operating in their interests as it is designed to do. This is also linked to the increasingly dire situation we find ourselves in. It is why members of the ruling class such as Nadhim Zahawi are able to keep their stables heated for their horses while we and our friends and family members look set to freeze and starve this winter onwards, those of us who are not starving already that is. It explains the absurd, disgusting and never-ending advice from wealthy people for us to simply wear extra layers, buy extra kettles, eat potatoes and porridge or use a microwave while the rich remain heated and inconvenienced in their lives of privilege and luxury, including the obscenely privileged royals who leech off us in pure delight.
And no doubt it’s not just Tories and royals. Much the same is also no doubt going on regarding all other politicians such as those in the Labour Party, who fire blanket and divert working class anger and autonomous alternatives from below. And no doubt that includes Andy Burnham, being put forward from some quarters as some kind of ‘champion of the working class’. But at the end of the day he’s a member of the bourgeoisie, He’s a Blairite, privatiser of hospitals, Iraq War criminal and expenses fiddler. While we suffer the cold and inflation the likes of Burnham will be unaffected, living in their warm, cosy homes with no money worries. The system punishes working class people for being poor and rewards the wealthy and the ruling class for their class privilege and sociopathy.
This is why we need to reject the entire ruling political class and their system, no matter how left wing they purport to be, no matter how much they claim to be on our side. We are not all in the same boat and never will be for as long as we still have to suffer this capitalist system built on inequality and injustice. It’s time to make sure the entire ruling political class is not unaffected or secure, that we make it perfectly clear what the situation is. As we have always said, it is increasingly urgent for as many of the working class to come together and fight back and organise against this barbaric system from below. It is now time, more than ever, for autonomous subversion and revolt from the working class. To do what we can for the cause of solidarity, working class unity and class war.
AnarCom Network 