The Coin Polls

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31032, 12 April 1966, Page 14

The Coin Polls

The polls on the choice of designs for New Zealand’s decimal coins virtually ensure that the final selection will be popular, democratically based, non-contro-versial, and thoroughly conservative. The range of designs on which the polls were taken almost excluded any other result, but the voting has probably confirmed it. A counting of heads, not randomly selected, but of those persons who took the trouble to cast their votes, could not alter the designs. Public opinion, assessed in this way and founded on preliminary drawings, was predictably conservative. It was never likely to produce the adventurous selection which was just possible with the designs offered. In the absence of an original selection by the Design Advisory Committee, which was more attuned in subject and style to the 1970’5, there may seem to be no alternative but to accept a safe, popular, and middle-of-the-road decision.

In style, the most favoured designs leave New Zealand well behind Australia. In subject, the polls favour well-worn themes and tend to exclude human figures. The preference for the Endeavour on the 50 cent coin celebrates nothing “exclusively related “ to New Zealand ”, as the Under-Secretary of Finance (Mr Muldoon) described the results of the polls. The Royal Society and Cook enthusiasts will be delighted. Botanists, zoologists and ethnologists may be pleased with the other decorations. The kiwi on the 20 cent coin is slightly plumper than its cousin on the florin; the Maori mask (10 cents) is reminiscent of the half penny, though that is no disqualification; the tui on the penny and the huia on the sixpence have been banished in favour of vegetation, and a tuatara is much less lively than the muscular Maori warrior on our shilling. If the Government shelters behind the results of the polls. New Zealand will not have moved far from the familiar decorations on our present coinage and the Government will not have led public opinion to accept a more animated and stylish set of coins. It still has the opportunity to give this lead. The polls should not dictate the "final decision.