Michelle Mone – a successful inspiration or ambitious diva?

Better than any drama, reality TV or thriller has been BBC 2's two-part documentary The Rise and Fall of Michelle Mone.

- 

Mone was a flag bearer for British entrepreneurism, with her rags-to-riches journey from Glasgow's disadvantaged East End to becoming a member of the House of Lords.

Her successes were overshadowed by controversies concerning the awarding of lucrative PPE contracts during the Covid-19 pandemic.

I was gripped by what was ultimately style over substance - three words one of the interviewees used to describe Mone.

Other three words volunteered to describe the woman who pioneered the gel-filled bra cup included: “shameless, self-promoting grifter”.

Her first husband Michael called her “stark raving mad”. BBC journalist Laura Kuenssberg went for something far less damning: “Impossible to ignore.”

The claws were out in the catty two-parter which appealed to the mean streak in mean-minded viewers, like me, who revel in the fall of the mighty.