Rural elderly "risking theft’

Press, 27 May 1989, Page 4

Rural elderly "risking theft’

Rural elderly people will be at further risk of theft and assault if more Postßank facilities in rural areas close, says a national council for the aging. The president of Age Concern New Zealand, Mrs Lysbeth Noble, said yesterday that people would have to travel greater distances to a bank and be tempted to draw out large sums. “We are constantly reminding elderly people not to keep large sums of money in their houses or on them, as they lay themselves open to theft and assault.”

A meeting of South Island branches of Age Concern' in Christchurch during the last two days had expressed concern at the reports of elderly people in rural areas drawing out

large amounts 'of money to “tide them over.”

In some • parts of rural . South Island, people were having to travel 110 km to the next township to find banking and postal facilities, as a result of Postßank closings.

The Government had “completely abdicated” its social responsibility in failing to ensure an adequate banking facility for the public in areas where Postßank had closed, and which had no other banking facility, said Mrs Noble. A Parliamentary select committee had already recommended that Government subsidies be used to reinstate banking services in isolated areas where the withdrawal of PostBank had caused unreasonable hardship.