Use for super. money suggested

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33478, 8 March 1974, Page 12

Use for super. money suggested

A suggestion that money from the superannuation scheme be used for Government and local authority spending was made by the manager of the North Canterbury Electric Power Board (Mr D. W. Harris) last evening.

Mr Harris cited “pitifully under-subscribed” local body loans in Christchurch which could be filled with money from the superannuation scheme lent at low interest.

Servicing of loans was one of the more expensive items on rates, and savings from the low-cost money could be passed to ratepayers. To assess the amount of money required for capital expenditure, Mr Harris advocated a system similar to the Australian one grouping local authority and Government spending into one item each year. Mr Harris, who was opening the thirty-eighth annual conference of the Institute of Electricans, said: “The South Island may be short of shipping, sugar, and soap, but [one thing we are not short I lof is water power.”

y The idea of a city at Roly leston was sound policy, parli ticularly for industry, bey cause the country’s welfare tt depended on the development :. of the South Island’s indus-

trial potential and its electricity generating capacity’, he said. The Mayor (Mr N, G. Pickering) welcomed conference delegates to Christchurch.