The Evening Star SATURDAY, APRIL 2, 1870

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2155, 2 April 1870, Page 2

The Evening Star SATURDAY, APRIL 2, 1870

Were it not that it is due to the public to set a matter in its true light that was much misrepresented in the Daily Times of Thursday, we should not have thought the childish conclusion arrived at in the editorial column worthy of remark. There can be no objection whatever to a person forming political

theories for himself, although in practice they might prove detrimental to the ’ interests of society. Neither is there the slightest objection to the publication of such theories, so long as they appear in the shape of fair and candid argument, and give a truthful representation of facts. But when these equitable conditions are neglected —when truth and honor are sacrificed to political or personal spleen, and when charges are brought against a Ministry, calculated to create alarm in the stability of institutions, the utility of which depends upon the confidence reposed in them —to neglect to expose the falsehood would be a sin against society. On Thursday morning, Dunedin was startled by an announcement that “a proposal” was “made “ yesterday by the Colonial Treasurer “ to the trustees of the Dunedin Sav- “ ings Bank,” and that it “ seems to “ have occasioned considerable appre- “ hension.” Then follows a long rigmarole about the mode in which the proposal was made, the evident intention of which statements is to shew that the Colonial Treasurer was actuated by some sinister view in striving to get hold of the deposits in the Savings Bank. The simple history of the affair is that in the year 1858 an Act was passed to provide fer the management of Savings Banks, and under its provisions one was established in Dunedin, no matter in what year. It ■was founded on the model of such institutions at Home ; its affairs have been conducted by trustees who have no personal interest in them, and who have been so careful in the manage-

ment as to vender tlie Dunedin Savings Bank one of the safest and most profitable institutions of the kind perhaps in the world. But the advantages of Post Office Savings Banks became so manifest, not only on account of the evidently increased security to depositors, but of the facility for receiving repayment of deposits in any part of the Colony, that in 18G7 an Act was passed for their establishment in New Zealand. It would have been very imperfect in its provisions had not the means been prescribed by which Savings Banks on the old system might merge their business into the Post Office Savings Banks. By the 22nd clause of the Management of Savings Banks Act, 1858, the interest to depositors was guaranteed by the Government, but as in Post Office Savings Banks machinery is provided by which the Government has immediate control over investments for the security of which it is liable, it is manifestly the duty of any Ministry, no matter what their politics, on the score of economy and national security, to include all Savings Banks under one common management. With this intention, a private telegram was addressed to one of the trustees by the Treasurer, that forms the text on which the puerile alarmist conclusions of our leading journal were founded. By permission we are enabled to lay it before our readers, the most sceptical of whom will have some difficulty in discovering in it any indication of the sinister intentions attributed to the Treasurer of wishing to get hold of savings banks deposits to expend on defence purposes. The telegram was as follows : —■“ What “ about savings banks 1 Will trustees “be willing to hand over to Post “ Office 1 We will agree that surplus “be disposed of as they direct, I will “ come down, if necessary, when I re- “ turn from Auckland in about three “ weeks.” The surplus here alluded to is the profit that, through the excellent management of the trustees, has accrued from the banking operations since the establishment ol the Dunedin Savings Bank, and which remains for disposal as they deem best for the welfare of the town. It was to consider this proposition that the meeting on Tuesday was convened. Perhaps before concluding this explanation it would be better to say that by the Post Office Savings Bank Amendment Act, 1860, and the Public Revenues Act, 18G7, deposits in savings banks arc payable into an account termed the Public Trust Funds Account, and cannot be appropriated to any such purpose as the Daily Times asserts. It is true this arrangement is acknowledged in the article we condemn ; but in the next paragraph this special safeguard is represented as no safeguard at all, because of some imaginary tendency to a financial coup d'etat, inconceivable to any man of common sense, or who has the slightest notion of the duties of responsible Ministers. Having stated simply and plainly how the case really stands, in order that no unfounded apprehension may be raised, we leave our contemporary to addle a few more viper’s eggs in his mare’s nest.