Insurance Rates.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 228, 28 September 1887, Page 8

Insurance Rates.

(To the Editor.)

Sib, —Eow very little changed is human nature now from what it was long centuries ago, when the rich man thanked God he ■was not as other men are. Your correspondent " Insurer " (? Insured) writes in much the same strain, when he says the honest man has to pay for the dishonest one ; and then goes on to say the honest ones should band themselves together, etc., etc. How rich ! What a glorious band it would be to be sure. There is, however, onlyonedifficulty in the way of the consummation of this grand sublime idea, and that is who is to ]udge in this world betwesn the honest and dishonest ; and who is to go surety that the honest man shall remain honest. I assume " Insureo" would not brand as dishonest any of his brethren until, or unless, they had been proved to bo such, morally or legally. All is not gold that glitters. The so-called respectable, and so far as the public knows, honest man, may be only such just so long as ifc suits his convenience, and no longer. There are many such in Auckland, perhaps not more than in other towns, still they do exist in ouv midst, as witness the cases that so frequently crop up in the Supreme Court, Police Court, and Bankruptcy Court. There on trial you see men whom once you knew, or thought you. knew, as honest citizens—a term and nothing more—for do nofc the revelations in those same courts open wide to the public gaze the shallowness of much of our so-called honesty. Insurance companies would undoubtedly prefer to deal with only men who are honest in very truth. But to selectsuch, audsuch only, would be a task at; once as invidious and impossible of realisation as for "Insurer" to band and keep together all those who are considered by competent authority to be honest, with the understanding that they should remain honest, . Insurance companies then, so far as honesty is concerned, have only one course open to them, and that is to treat every, man as honestly disposed until or unless they have reanon to beiievethecontrary and very often, through no want of vigilance on their part. Tho discovery that a. client is acting wrongly by them, comes rafchei' late in the day, and when perchance it hi difficult to sheet the charge home to him ; for there is no crime more difficult to prove than a:-son. Let " Insurer interview the several occupants of at»y block of wooden buildings, and I vetjtims to say one snd all of tbem would say they would nob insure ab all — only fes their n&igbboura—yet not quo of them, by th& world, may bg considered io&s lio«esfc ih&n yonv eon'espoijdenfc — f( In, seres.',? c? fkm Yonvs, etc, " Yebitab,"