CO-OPERATIVE BANKS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 95, 12 October 1911, Page 5

CO-OPERATIVE BANKS

GOVERNMENT SCHEME. DKT.VI LS GIVEN BY SIR JOHN FIXDLAY, Auckland, October 10. The proposal to establish co-operative banks in New Zealand on the lines of the successful Continental institutions WB9 referred to in detail last night at Parncll by Sir John Findlay. He said that if a number of men signified their intention to go on the land and wanted they money they would be incorporated in a farmers' co-operative bank, and would then have power to borrow from the lending institutions of the Government a sum to be fixed in proportion to their number and property. That sum would be apportioned to them. They could lend it as they pleased, and it would be guaranteed by the Government. The bank would lend to any of its members without a penny of security. That was an alarming thing for the State to do, some people would say, but he would answer that it had been done in Germany, Belgium and other countries, and had done an immense amount of good. A man who Wanted £SO to buy a horse, a cow, or a piece of farm machinery, could apply to the association and get it without bringing security, probably at 4or 4Vi per cent, interest. What security is there? It is' the man's honesty, his industry, and his character. The .ideal of democracy is that a man of good character, able to make use of money, should get it. (Applause.) "Too good to be true," interrupted one of the audience. Sir John Findlav: .Well, wait, and you will see it in operation next year. 3le went on to say that 930 of the banks were lending a hundred millions sterling ill (iernmit'i'.

Another interrupter shouted. "Pawnbroking," to which the speaker's prompt retort wa«. "I have heard that said before, but i am not afraid of a name." The twenty men or -o constituting the ban!: were, lie ec'iitmu'j.'l, jointly am', *evi rallv !iab!» for the los-i-. and so, when a man eanw> to lim-row money from them they could .-ay. " Weil, you are not a sober, industrious man. We cannot lend you money, beeau.s:' yon have not these'qualities." Thus .the effect of the farmers' co-operative bank scheme would bo a moralising one. The farmer who could not get money unless he led a sober, industrious life, found, it useful to lead that sort of life; thus the bank became an educative agent of powerful character. It was not intended to grant large sums through co-operative banks, because large loans could bo obtained as at present from the Advances to Settlers Department. The whole scheme was to enable a man with 110 monfly, but good character, to get money to assist him in his industry.