HAD TO PAY BACK.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 255, 28 October 1929, Page 4

HAD TO PAY BACK.

DIRECTOR FACES COURT. Last month the Court ordered George Alan Bond, formerly governing and managing director of George A. Bond and Co., Ltd., to pay the liquidators £89,893. This sum was made up of £41,267, refund of directors' fees; £2534) money paid to his father as a gratuity; £35,708, business commissions 'and discounts in connection with the New Brunswick Company; £2605, travelling expenses; £7750, interest at 5 p.c.. The facts are related by the "Wild Cat Monthly" as follows:—_ "When the company was formed in 1920 shareholders fixed the governing-director's remuneration at £4800 .p.a., but in 1922 a resolution was passed leaving the matter of remuneration to Mr. Bond's own discretion. He decided that £10,000 p.a. was not too much. But the company's articles apparently .' required the amount to be fixed by shareholders, so that the 1922 resolution was not what it looked. For a long.time the company paid Mr. Bond's father £7 per week, apparently for advice given in the family circle. Further, Mr. Bond drew £10 per week as travelling expenses, whether the actual cost came to that or not. Also he received substantial sums as commissions, etc., on transactions between the company here and his firm in New Brunswick; Canada. He was ordered to refund the commission on the Bale price of goods, and to account for any rebates or other advantages received from the American sellers, and which were not deducted from the sale price noted on the invoices. * "All this 'is very satisfactory as far as it goes, no doubt. But what were the directors, of the company doing through all these years ? It is mighty poor comfort for shareholders if protection comes to them only through a liquidator."