SMALL SAVINGS IN BRITAIN

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 266, 6 August 1929, Page 16

SMALL SAVINGS IN BRITAIN

' A STAGGERING TOTAL. Reviewing the --“British Labour Party’s financial proposals, in the "Nineteenth Century,” Sir John Marriott says :.“I remember that Mr. Snowden himself, when Chancellor of the Exchequer, confessed that he was ‘staggered by the magnitude of the contributions which are made by the working-people of to-day, in one form or another, to provide for what we colloquially call a rainy day.’ He subsequently furnished me with the figures to which he referred. For the year ending March 31, 1924—by no means a prosperous year—they amounted to no less than £216,380,000.” Details are given of this compilation, which comprised deposits in the various classes of savings banks, and savings through co-operative, building, friendly and collecting societies, national certificates, trade unions’ benefit funds and industrial assurance. Sir John Marriott adds: “These figures are in truth ‘staggering,’ but .they tell only half the story; only indeed, a fragment of it. They take no account of small investments in railway companies, banks, industrial companies, chief rents (a very popular form of security for small investors in Lancashire), and, above all, in small house property. The last item alone would still account for at least £300,000,000 of savings on the part of persons not liable to income tax, and before the war accounted for much more. The shareholders in the four great railway groups number about 800,000, a large proportion of whom hold very small amounts. The ‘big five’ banks have between them over 275,000 shareholders, with average holdings (nominal) of a little over £2OO. It is difficult to arrive at any exact estimate of the aggregate savings of the small Investor, but two or three years ago I hazarded an estimate of £2,500,000,000, contributed by some 15,000,000 Investors, only to be assure., by an eminent banker that. I had greatly understated it, and that the amount was nearer £4,000,000,000.”