CANNOT AFFORD TO SPECULATE

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 78, 2 April 1913, Page 5

CANNOT AFFORD TO SPECULATE

A DRAMATIC CHALLENGE.

LONDON, April 1

At the sitting of the Marconi Inquiry Committee to-day Mr Lloyd George dramatically challenged any member of the House of Commons to formulate charges against him. It was cowardly and mean, he said., to skulk behind and to circulate slanders to journalists. He always proceeded on the principle of not speculating. He regarded an investment as something permanent for the sake «if dividends, while speculation was buying in .order to sell. Having a family, lie had never done that. ... •

When cross-examined, he admitted that he sold 857 out of the first 1,000 shares within, three days at a profit of £749, and paid his brokers only a third of the purchase money. The brokers advanced the rest, and still held the shares as "a security. Mr Lloyd George offered to produce his pass-book, and handed in a list of his investments.

Mr Herbert Samuel (PostmasterGeneral) gave evidence that he never held, shares in any Marconi Ojiapany.