Eyebrows rose at the official dinner at the Grosvenor House to mark IP Week, the annual jamboree for the oil industry. All the big oil companies take tables, but this year there was a conspicuous absentee. No sign of BP, the UK’s biggest company, which by coincidence, doubtless, is now emerging from its worst year ever. BP confirms that no one saw fit to book space. Those with long memories recall that last year Lord Browne of Madingley, the BP chief executive, gave the keynote address and used it to rubbish Shell, then emerging from its missing reserves scandal. What goes around, comes around, a lesson not lost on this year’s speaker, Jeroen van der Veer, Browne’s counterpart at Shell, who was careful to steer clear of any such triumphalism.

This is Rob Moodie, a 68-year-old New Zealand lawyer who has been found guilty of contempt at the High Court in Wellington. Moodie was not convicted because of his decision to dress up as Alice in Wonderland for his court appearances, as they are an understanding lot in the New Zealand courts and take this kind of thing in their stride, but because he released a confidential report about a case he was working on involving the fatal collapse of a bridge. He has been suspended from practising for three months. You do wonder where he found the dress.

Plan for T-shirt laden with bad taste fails

A Florida man has been blocked by the US authorities from trademarking the name “Obama bin Laden”. The curiously named Alexandre Batlle had intended to use the trademark on a range of goods including a T-shirt which, with impeccable taste, featured the American Democrat presidential hopeful Barack Obama in a turban with an assault rifle next to Hillary Clinton leashed like a dog and wearing a burka. Delightful. Now go for the Jewish vote. The US Patent and Trademark Office deemed the idea in breach of various ordinances including one involving “scandalous refusal” and, bizarrely, another that requires Osama bin Laden to give his written consent.

There is an odious and libellous e-mail doing the rounds of the City concerning the private life of . . . well, let’s not go there. It concerns the marriage of the offspring of a very big City name and claims to contain e-mails that suggest all is not well with the marriage. I am not quite stupid enough to name names, but the anonymous source who sent it to me clearly hopes I am.

Little-known fact about Brady Dougan, the new chief of Credit Suisse: he has twice dressed up at corporate functions as the blonde one in Abba. The female one, that is. Agnetha. Apparently the Swiss contingent weren’t terribly amused.

What am I describing? Once inside the building your picture is taken and your body weight is recorded at both entry and exit points. Sensitive areas are resistant to explosives, guns and thermic lances. There are mantraps . . . The headquarters of the Counter Terrorist Unit in 24? No, the above comes from Rameswurlall Basant Roi, the governor of the Bank of Mauritius, quoted by Central Banking, on his new HQ on the idyllic tropical island.

Someone has taken a stand against the rampant bonus culture in business and the City. I note from the Prime Minister’s website that there is an e-petition buried in there calling for the regulation of “seasonal or performance-related bonus payments”. We shall see what comes of a doubtless well-meaning but not terribly well-written submission by David Burton, which has as yet attracted exactly six other signatories. Early days, then.

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