GENERAL ELECTION

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 112, 7 November 1935, Page 11

GENERAL ELECTION

POINTS TO ANSWER

MR. HISLOP AND GOLD

QUESTIONS FOR MR. COATES i

(By Telegraph—Press Association.) TAURANGA, Tills Da3'.

The Leader of the Democrats (Mr. T. C. A. Hislop) arrived here from Auckland yesterday and addressed a meeting of about five hundred in the Town Hall last night. He was well received and spoke for an hour and a quarter, following closely on the lines of previous addresses. Mr. Hislop dealt more particularly with unemployment and exchange.

In connection with the controversy between himself and Mr. Coates regarding taking over the gold of the trading- banks, he asked Mr. Coates to answer the following questions: (1) Did the Government of Canada or any other country pay for gold taken in notes of a currency already depreciated by political pressure? (2) Is it not a fact that in every other country the gold taken from the banks, with the attendant profit, was handed to the central bank as security for their obligations to the public and their depositors, instead of being used in a j large measure, as was done by Mr. Coates, to balance his Budget? (3) As a result of Mr. Coates's operations, what will the value of a Reserve Bank note be should England revert to the gold standard, which may occur at any time? The last question was not an academic one to a debtor country like New Zealand, with heavy obligations to England. It was a very pressing one to the entire community and to local bodies which have loans and interest to pay in London. They were entitled to an answer.

Mr. Hislop concluded by remarking that he had behind him a record of three generations of public life and was not afraid of Messrs. Forbes and Coates or their criticism. He was accorded a vote of thanks for his interesting and enlightening address.