TAYLOR MEMORIAL.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 1039, 5 September 1911, Page 3

TAYLOR MEMORIAL.

lively meeting of the

COMMITTEE

Christchurch, Sept. 4,

The special meeting of the T. E. Taylor memorial committee, held this afternoon to receive a statement from the treasurer relative to the exact financial position of Mrs Taylor and the family, led to some heated discussion concerning the parties responsible for the circulation of statements described to be wilfully and maliciously false as to the value of the late Mr Taylor’s estate and the estate of his widow.

The Mayor (Mr J. J. Dougall), who presided, ruled that he would not allow any argument, liquor v. uo-license, to take place. Mr G. Bowron, a member of the executive committee, persisted in making statements to which the Mayor objected, and finally Mr Dougall lett the room, expressing regret that he had been driven to adopt that course. The meeting then broke up. Before the climax came, however, a statement detailing the value of Mr and Mrs Taylor’s estates was made by Mr Salter, which statement, the Mayor said, furnished a complete answer to the allegations made to the effect that Mrs Taylor had been left most comlortably off.

Mr Salter stated that that morning Mr Cole, Mr Isitt, M.P., Mr McCombs, and himself had gone carefully into the figures relative to Mr and Mrs Taylor’s estate. They went to the Valuation Office and obtained the Government valuations of the properties they had to deal with. The position was as follows: —The total value of the properties in which Mrs Taylor had an interest was ,£IBB6 13s 3d. That included the house where the family was living, onethird interest in another property adjoining, a property in Hazeldeau road, and a property at Akaroa. The total income from all sources, including the property left by Mr Taylor, was £lB5 15s 6d. They had already stated, after going into the figures roughly, that the value of Mr Taylor’s property was £2344. The figures ascertained carefully subsequently showed that they over-estimated the amount, the total being ,£2,340 17s 6d. There were two items which were interest-producing, namely, a loan on mortgage and a house property in Harman street. The other properties were not in-terest-producing, and the bulk of the cash would have to go to pay debts and to discharge a legacy to Mr Taylor’s mother. The statement, therefore, made by Mr Bishop at the opening meeting was well within the facts, and the total income available was not as much by £SO as was expected would be the case. The figures he had presented had been gone into by the four he had named, the actual figures from the Government Valuation Department being taken.

The Mayor : lam very pleased to hear that statement, because I think it will be regarded as a complete answer to any insinuations made on the subject. AN EXPLANATION. Mr E. Nordon, secretary of the licensed Victuallers’ Association the gentleman referred to by name at the meeting as the one primarily responsible for the circulation of the false rumours through New Zealand of Mrs Taylor’s means, gives an emphatic denial to the statements made. He explains that, while having tea with a friend and another gentleman whom he did not know at the lime, but whom he had since ascertained was a friend of Mr tv. M. Isitt’s, he was drawn into a no-liceuse argument, the conversation being brought round to the question of the Taylor memorial fund. He said in the course of the conversation, that he had just been informed that Mrs Taylor had in her own right, and that he had further been informed that that tact would be made public in a few days. He did not repeat that statement either before or after that conversation at the tearooms, and never imagined that any person would be guilty of such a breach of confidence as to repeat a liieudly conversation. He gave an emphatic denial to the statement made at the meeting that either he or the trade had done anything to injure the Taylor memorial fund.