A long-running National Crime Agency investigation continues into multi-million PPE contracts awarded during the Covid pandemic to a company linked to island-based businessman Doug Barrowman and his wife Baroness Michelle Mone.

The spectacular rise and fall of lingerie tycoon Michelle Mona is explored in a two-part BBC documentary which first aired last week.

PPE Medro was awarded government contracts in May 2020 worth more than £200m to supply masks and surgical gowns.

The company is being sued by the government over the £122m contract to supply sterile surgical gowns which were never used, having been rejected on delivery.

Ms Mone initially denied having any role or function with PPE Medpro, nor in the process by which the company was awarded contracts.

But three years on, she admitted she had lied to the media about the extent of her involvement.

The Rise and Fall of Michelle Mone charts her meteoric rise from humble beginnings in Glasgow’s East End to become one of Britain’s most celebrated female entrepreneurs.

Having left school at 15, and written off as a non-starter, she went on to build up her Ultimo bra business from scratch. She received an OBE in 2010 and then made a peer in the House of Lords by then Prime Minister David Cameron in 2015.

But there were questions about how successful a businesswoman she really was.

In 2016, she announced her relationship with billionaire Doug Barrowman, founder of the Isle of Man-based the Knox Group

The couple married in the Isle of Man in November 2020 and lived at their £25m Ballakew country estate in St Mark’s.

After the National Crime Agency launched an investigation into PPE Medpro in early 2022, several properties owned by them were raided including their home in the Isle of Man.

A leaked HSBC bank document showed that from the profits of PPE Medpro at least £65m had been paid to the accounts of Doug Barrowman in the Isle of Man, with one transfer of £29m into the Keristal Trust, the beneficiaries of which included Michelle Mone and her three adult children.

In an interview with the BBC Baroness Mone said: ‘I can’t see what we’ve done wrong. Saying to the press “I’m not involved” to protect my family, can I make this clear, is not a crime.’

She took a leave of absence from the House of Lords. PPE Medpro is still under investigation by the NCA.

In a statement, a representative for Michelle Mone and Doug Barrowman said they had provided full and detailed statements to the NCA and co-operated with the investigation throughout.

The spokesperson said: ‘They have never been arrested, and no charges have been brought against them.

‘PPE Medpro successfully supplied 210 million Type IIR masks, all at competitive prices, which were ultimately deployed in the NHS. Twenty five million gowns were supplied, which the DHSC collected from the factory gate in China. There was no profiteering.

‘The gowns were stored on behalf of the DHSC for significant lengths of time in poor conditions.’