Tory peer dubbed 'Baroness Bra' must repay £122MILLION for breaching Covid contract

The company, a consortium led by Lady Michelle Mone's husband and businessman, Doug Barrowman, was awarded Government contracts by former Conservative administration to supply PPE during the Covid pandemic.

It came after she recommended it to ministers.

Government lawyers told a trial earlier this year that it was entitled to recover the £121million cost of the contract.

It also said it was seeking the costs of transporting and storing the items, amounting to £8,648,691.

Both Lady Mone and her husband have denied wrongdoing.

Barristers for the firm told the trial it had been "singled out for unfair treatment".

The barristers accused the Government of "buyer's remorse", claiming that the gowns became defective due to the conditions they were kept in.

It also issued a counterclaim, saying DHSC owed a duty of care to the company to advise it on compliance with the contract.

Mrs Justice Cockerill said the contract was a "complex document", however, she found that PPE Medpro had "breached the contract".

She added the DHSC was "entitled to the price of the gowns as damages" due to them not being used as sterile gowns.

Mrs Justice Cockerill dismissed PPE Medpro's counterclaim, saying it was "contrary to long established legal principle".

She said the money must be paid by 4pm on October 15.

Following the judgment, Mr Barrowman said it was a "travesty of justice" and gave the "DHSC an establishment win".

"This judgment is a whitewash of the facts and shows that justice was being seen to be done, where the outcome was always certain for the DHSC and the Government," he said.

"This case was simply too big for the Government to lose."

It comes after Chancellor Rachel Reeves revealed the Government continued to recover funds from inefficient contracts which were awarded during the pandemic by the former administration.

She asserted that Labour would continue to fight to reclaim misspent money on PPE contracts and Covid “corruption”, as she told the party’s conference “we want our money back”.

The Chancellor has been outlining what she views as key shortcomings of the previous administration, citing Liz Truss’s mini-budget, the “botched Brexit deal,” and describing it as “the worst parliament on record for living standards”.

Ms Reeves said nearly £400million has already been reclaimed from pandemic-related fraud that occurred under the Conservative government.

She noted that recovery efforts are ongoing, and the current administration is introducing “additional new powers to investigate and recover more money from fraudsters”.

To enforce these powers, Ms Reeves announced the formation of a specialist team: “I can tell you today that to deploy those new powers, we are recruiting a new hit squad to investigate and recover all the money that is owed to the British people.”

But she said the “most enduring consequences of the Conservatives’ time in office is their economic failure”.