GOVERMENT GIVES ARK FUNDRAISER £1M BOOST
TOMORROW night’s Ark hedge fund gala has moved to the centre of the political agenda, after the government agreed to match private donations to the tune of £1m for the charity’s vaccination programme in Zambia.
Led by development secretary Andrew Mitchell, the pledge is part of the government’s commitment to increasing British taxpayer contributions to the UN-backed Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisations – the body set up by Microsoft founder Bill Gates – ahead of GAVI’s international conference starting in London next Friday.
“This is a great financial boost and a hugely significant endorsement,” said a spokesperson for Ark, which has committed $5.5m over three years to vaccinating 160,000 infants in Zambia against diarrhoea caused by Rotavirus. The virus kills more children under five in Africa than AIDS, malaria and measles combined.
Guests who bid for the auction lot to buy vaccines – one of 18 charity and luxury lots on the night – will each contribute £3,000. This sum was previously enough to immunise 100 children, but will now stretch further following this week’s announcement by GlaxoSmithKline and Merck & Co that they will lower their Rotavirus vaccine prices.
So a flying start for this year’s fundraising efforts. Ark told The Capitalist that it will be happy if tomorrow’s gala raises “in the low double-digit millions” for its international projects. But the boost from the government has given it the best possible chance of beating 2010’s £14.1m, troubled economic climate or not.
TIME AT THE BAR
CLIENT meetings may never be the same again for Tim Beale, litigation partner at SJ Berwin, as his favourite gastropub, The Engineer in Primrose Hill, is fighting to save itself from reoccupation by its landlord Mitchells & Butlers.
“It’s almost home from home,” Beale told The Capitalist, who said he will stop entertaining clients at the pub if the FTSE 250 firm takes back the lease in October from current lettee Eddie Francis, because he fears “the extraordinary level of detail and care” won’t be replicated by the corporate chain.
Over to Mitchells & Butlers, which insists it will continue running the venue as “a unique, warm and welcoming community pub”. “We have no intention of converting The Engineer into any sort of branded operation,” said a spokesperson. “It will continue as a distinctive, individual and characterful London landmark.”
Although it could be all change again, following yesterday’s reports that the group’s minority shareholders are plotting a £1.74bn takeover for the chain, which would make the pub’s new landlords the billionaire Spurs stakeholder Joe Lewis with the Irish racing tycoons JP McManus and John Magnier.
With that level of firepower behind the venue, The Capitalist is sure The Engineer’s famed wine list wouldn’t suffer too badly.
GONE WALKABOUT
HEAD to Hyde Park on 18 June to support the London Walkabout, a 5k loop starting from Hyde Park undertaken by senior bankers to raise funds to buy wheelchairs for the developing world.
The event is organised by former Goldmans banker Carolina Gonzalez-Bunster (left) who set up The Walkabout Foundation when her brother was paralysed in a car accident in 1994. Email londonwalkabout@thewalkaboutfoundation.org for more details.