Jennifer Arcuri's £100k grant was 'appropriate', says government review

A £100,000 grant awarded to US businesswoman Jennifer Arcuri has been deemed "appropriate" by government auditors.

The Internal Audit Agency looked at whether Ms Arcuri's company, Hacker House, was eligible for the funding.

It concluded: "The assessment of eligibility and subsequent reduced grant award to Hacker House Ltd was appropriate."

The grant was part of a programme by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport known as the Cyber Skills Immediate Impact Fund (CSIIF), which aims to support training and jobs in cyber security.

Ms Arcuri had initially applied for £273,000 before being awarded £100,000, says the agency's report.

Questions about the six-figure sum were raised after questions were raised about Ms Arcuri's relationship with Mr Johnson while he was Mayor of London.

MPs demanded to know whether Mr Johnson had showed favouritism and lobbied on behalf of Ms Arcuri.

They also wanted to know why the loan was granted when it was revealed Hacker House had failed to meet one of the application criteria.

The application clearly states that the value of the grant should not exceed 50% of the company's annual income, and yet this requirement was waived for Hacker House.

But auditors found Ms Arcuri's firm was one of three businesses awarded grants despite not meeting the 50% income requirement.

Culture Secretary Nicky Morgan said this was not unusual and is "regularly the case" with this kind of fund.

She wrote to MPs to say any suggestion that Boris Johnson or his advisers influenced the process was "simply not true".

There were also concerns that Hacker House was not a UK business as Jennifer Arcuri currently lives in the US, and the number of British based staff remains unclear.

Ms Morgan said because the company was working to boost the UK cyber security industry, and because Hacker House was registered in the UK, this wasn't a concern.

Ms Arcuri told ITV's Good Morning Britain earlier this month: "Never once did I ask him (Mr Johnson) for a favour.

"Never once did he write a letter of recommendation for me. He didn't know about my asking to go to trips."

Mr Johnson also previously told Sky News that "everything was done with complete propriety" - but refused to deny outright that he had an affair with the former model.

The London Assembly's oversight committee is looking into the links between the city's former mayor and Ms Arcuri.

Mr Johnson's initial submission to the committee was deemed "insufficient"