BANKRUPT ESTATES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 53, 23 July 1914, Page 2

BANKRUPT ESTATES.

THE PREVALENCE OF PRIVATE ASSIGNMENTS. IWARNING TO BUSINESS MEN. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Auckland, July 21. A statement which will prove of considerable interest to the business community was made by Mr W. S. Fisher,' Official Assignee, in Auckland, at the conclusion of a meeting of creditors which was attended by a number of prominent business men. Mr Fisher referred to the satisfactory results of the administration, of an estate by his office. "For this, I don't claim any special merit for my office," said Mr Fisher. "The estate was a clean one and easily worked, but I can, at least, claim that the assets had not been frittered away or wasted, and the administration goes to show that provided my office lias material to work upon, it can do quite as well as private trustees. Now, as you know, for "some years past there has been a steady movement towards placing the elcaner and more remunerative estates in the .hands of private trusts. To such an extent lias this been the case, that in other centres the work of administration of bankrupt estates has been carried on at a loss, while in Auckland it has little more than paid its way. In consequence, the Government, for the sake of economy, proposes to hand over the work to another department. This has aL ready been done in two other centres— Ohristchurch and Dunedin—where the duputy Public Trustees now act as official assignees, and it is proposed to do the same in Auckland. If this change is brought ab6ut, I think- it will result in a wholesale movement towards private assignments. Business men will recognise that their interests cannot be properly looked after by an official who is already fully loaded with his own work, and they will take care that estates in which they are interested shall not go to him. This will mean that in future there will be no investigations and enquiries such as are now conducted in bankruptcy, arid no prosecutions. Debtors will soon realise that they will be able to commit all sorts of fraud, and nothing will be said to them, and, in fact, one lever will have gone which helped to keep the commercial atmosphere clear. If you think there is anything in my contention, 1 would point out that the remedy is in your own hands. Usually it lies with you to say where an insolvent estate shall go, and you will have to choose whether you will support the machinery provided by the Government for doing this class of work .or 'whether you will be driven to a ; wholesale to private assignments."