ONE STATE BANK

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30121, 3 May 1963, Page 12

ONE STATE BANK

Objection By Staff Group

(N.Z. Press Association)

WELLINGTON, May 2

Mr F. P. Walsh’s declaration at the Federation of Labour conference that ‘‘there should be only one trading bank and that under 'he control of the State” has been challenged by the Banks’ Staff Action Movement.

In a statement the movement says; “It is well known that the project of the present Government to return the Bank of New Zealand to private enterprise was abandoned when it was realised that the earnings of the bank were insufficient to provide interest on the payment made for that banks' shares in 1945. and its sale could be carried out only a: a loss to the State and indirectly to the people of New Zealand “It is clear, then, that the easy profits’ referred to by Mr Walsh, far from being large, are so low as to render banking a rather unattractive commercial proposition in this country at the present time Bank shareholders certainly would not regard their investments as spectacular earners over the last 25 years. “The existence of competing trading banks, anxious to secure business, assures the community of a high quality service at low cost. The removal of the spur of com petition and of the availability to dissatisfied ustomers of an alternative service, would surely be inequitable to the people of New Zealand and contrary to the public interest. “Mr Walsh offers no evidence for his statement that the present competitive iperations of trading banks are damaging."