FORENSIC FINANCE

Putaruru Press, Volume VI, Issue 242, 21 June 1928, Page 4

FORENSIC FINANCE

GRAND old man Sir Robert Stout may be, but it cannot be said that he “has enhanced his reputation by his defence of the Government’s policy in relation to the Bank of New Zealand. According to the telegraphed report his arguments were that the Government appointed four directors as well as the London and New Zealand auditeVs, that 17i per cent was charged pastoral tenants when he came to New Zealand 64 years ago, and that poor people in the Dominion had an equal right to borrow cheap money as farmers had.

The first two statements are beside the point, and had Sir Robert elaborated the last argument he might possibly have got on the right track. The plain truth, and one that cannot be burked, is, that banka in New Zealand make greater profits than in any country in the world. In view of the fact that a very large proportion of electors hold the view that the proper function of a banking institution is to assist the businesses in a country and not to bleed them, the Government cannot cavil if thousands of electors regard the continued protestations of their desire to provide cheap money with suspicion. So long as the Government walks hand in hand with institutions whose profits enable them to water their stock to an inordinate degree, and also to pay enormous dividends derived from ‘taxes on enterprise, so long will their troubles ensue.

It is the short-sightedness of the Government in this respect that has ircreased the following of the Labour and other parties more than anything else, and so long as they continue to regard the situation with an ostrich-like outlook, so long will they be suspect.

The fact that a p.ortion of these immense profits go to the Government does not impress. It is not a Government’s function to create profits or to assist in so doing, and these sums would be far better utilised in cheapening the means of conducting business in general. In plain unvarnished terms there is a general feel-

ing throughout the country that the immense powers of our banking institutions could be curbed with decided benefit to the business community in general, and that any curbing done should affect the larger institutions as well as the people’s banks.