Bunhill: Corporate largess

FURTHER to my request for examples of corporate largess in these hard times, it is clear that Jacques Attali is not averse to pushing the boat out at the new European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. Last week, Attali, the president of the inter-governmental agency designed to ease the plight of eastern Europe, held a black tie dinner-dance for staff and spouses at the Grosvenor House Hotel in Park Lane.

About 1,000 people attended, at a cost of about pounds 100 per head of the taxpayers' money. In the view of some directors who were so offended they did not turn up, this could have financed a project in the less cheery east.