PUBLIC EXPENDITURE.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIX, Issue 5290, 22 June 1928, Page 4

PUBLIC EXPENDITURE.

SYDNEY’S NEW SAVINGS BANK.

AMOUNT DOUBLE THE ESTIMATE.

People who >vill rail against the expenditure- of money op public works like approaches to the bridge, railway stations that will give access to the people called upon to use them for expedition, railways and tramways that bring hearer the far sububs to the city, have (wites a Sydney corespondent) got something to dissect in the cost of the State Government Savings Bank building, which is now nearing completoin. It will be the most expensive buildijig ip Sydney, and probably, in the Commonwealth. As originally designed in 1922 it was estimated to cost £730,000 —fittings included, which., of course, meant safe deposits vaults. There are still £164.104 to pay in connection with the uncompleted contracts, so that when the new building throws open its doors it will have cost something more than £1,500,000- When the King opened Lloyd’s new . building in London, which cost just on £2,000,000', it was thought to be the limit, but with a little more encouragement the State Government’s Savings Bank might surpass that amount, and there would be some excuse for inviting not only the King and Queen, but the whole of the Royal family (including little Betty) to come and throw the doors wide open for the public to step inside to negotiate their overdrafts. The Commonwealth Bank, a few hundred yards away, the land for which is now valued at nearly £2OOO a foot, is a modest bungalow compared with this glistening pink palace with its mighty Greek pillars and. its bronze facings that would mint all. the copper coins of the realm. It will be .a. valuable asset to future Governments, for they can conceal their overdrafts without fear of them being discovered.