BANKS AND PUBLIC

Evening Post, Volume CXXVII, Issue 133, 8 June 1939, Page 12

BANKS AND PUBLIC

Services rendered by the, trading banks to the public were the subject of special remark by Mr. R. C. Addison, chairman of the New Zealand Associated Banks. Departing from the traditional reticence of the banker, he reminded the Bank Officers' Guild gathering last evening that "the trading banks have already rendered special service and intend to render further special service in co-operating with others in assisting to meet the special situation." He did not define that "special situation," as, perhaps, it was well understood by those he addressed; but the "general" situation is not always clear to the public at large. Hard things hav<3 been said about the banks in the past, and today, as a body, they are frequently the target of ill-informed criticism. They were accused, for instance, of "causing the last depression," but what they were to gain from such action and what they actually gained from it have never been stated. As a matter of fact, in the aggregate the banks of Great Britain and the Dominions made colossal losses; and so did their shareholders in greatlyreduced dividends and the depreciation in the market value of their investments. But there was no banking debacle in any part of the Empire. In New Zealand, as in Australia, the banks have "carried" or "nursed" all their customers who could be helped in this way. That action then may be said to have been in the | banks' interests, but it certainly was in the interest of those so assisted by the banks. Again, in the, present special circumstances of New Zealand, the banks are rendering and, according to Mr. Addison, intend to render further special service. It may be that immediate needs of .the Dominion as well as those of the banks' customers arc here referred to; but in any case it appears that once more the banks as a body are willing, ready, and prepared to meet a difficult situation that has not been of their own making.