Too Much "Speculative" Building in Auckland

Progress, Volume XI, Issue 10, 1 June 1916, Page 646

Too Much "Speculative" Building in Auckland

AUCKLAND FIRM OF BUILDERS REPROVED BY MAGISTRATE In Auckland recently two bankrupt builders were brought before the magistrate by the Official Assignee on charges of failing to keep proper books and with incurring debts whilst they were insolvent. The accused, and his son carried on business in the latter’s name, the father being responsible for the books and the son for watching the building operations. They carried on business without capital on the lines generally known as “Speculative building.

According to the evidence of the Assignee, when the business failed the accused's debts amounted to £968. There were no assets. No books had been kept, but, the defendants must have known that they were insolvent some considerable time before their bankruptcy, yet with that knowledge they had contracted considerable debts. Evidence was given by several creditors as to the manner in which credit had been obtained from them by the accused.

Herbert "William de Baugh admitted that books were not kept. Nevertheless, he said, when the debts were contracted reasonable hopes were held that they would be able to settle.

In convicting the accused, the magistrate said he had no sympathy with the style of building carried on by the accused. Building houses with other people's money, with the hopes of selling at a profit, was not right. He was surprised at business people, however. It was inconceivable that a person would be allowed to contract debts running into large amounts when there was no security other than word of , mouth. There had been too much speculative building in Auckland, and he was going to impose a sentence which he hoped would be a lesson to others. The elder accused would be sentenced to two months' imprisonment without hard labour, on each of the three charges of obtaining credit, the terms to be concurrent. The younger accused would be convicted and discharged on each charge. On the charge of failing to keep books both accused were convicted and discharged.

The gradual change in character which has been traced in the external treatment of houses of the later part of the seventeenth century and of the eighteenth is also to be found in the internal decoration. The exuberant and vivacious detail of Elizabethan and Jacobean work gave way to the more sober and scholarly rendering of Inigo Jones, Webb, Wren, and their successors.— J". Alfred Gotch. ',} '"■■'■■