BANKERS AND THE FINANCIAL STRINGENCY.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1632, 26 December 1912, Page 6

BANKERS AND THE FINANCIAL STRINGENCY.

Sir,—Will you allow me brief space to supplement my letter in your issue of Monday,- and in reply to my critic of this morning ?

Mr. Beauchaiup privately is, I am assured, a most estimable gentleman, and under the mantle of chairman, or actingchairman, of the Bank of' New Zealand, his remarks ought to be, of special value, but if not so, then, with a discreet silence, he might still be accepted as a Solon. Unfortunately, lie seems to have a penchant for talk, which, before now, has worked him evil, and this apparently and regrettably continues. In the instance criticised he made use of : the superficial and commonplace comparison of our imports and • ex-, porta, and attributed the narrow margin as due to private extravagance, and as the cause of the present iinancial stringency., I challenged his deduction, and pointed to a factor in a country's internal development ,of wealth, quoting the experience'of England, with its long continuing excess of imports, as illustrative, My sapient critic unv. tingly supports me in demolishing tho chairman's argument. I had not, in the case of Great Britain, overlooked foreign interest; according to the official figures it amounted in 1910 to .£100,900,000, but foreign investments are here inappreciable, and I quoted the home development of wealth, since.it far exceeds even interest as a factor in the British balance-sheet. Prominently, as instances in point, the expenditure on. railways, tramways, sanitation, buildings, shipping, factories, machinery, and multitudinous other improvements' are all features in a country's progress and solvency, and are greater in a relative degree in ■the progress,of a new country like New Zealand. There are salient facte which the chairman of the bank should study, and betimes he .would acquire a broader an<l sounder view of his subject, but. if he will talk and flounder along, he is, I fear, apt to endanger even the prestige of his new patrons.—l am, etc., . ' ONLOOKER. December ,2i, 1912.