BANK OF NEW ZEALAND

Greymouth Evening Star, 16 May 1945, Page 3

BANK OF NEW ZEALAND

STATE PURCHASE OPPOSED

■ WELLINGTON, May 15. A big meeting of Wellington businessmen in the concert chamber of the Town Hall to-day unanimously adopted a resolution protesting against the Government’s proposal to nationalise the Bank of New Zealand. The grounds given in support of the protest were: — ■ “That the proposed action is inimical to the financial stability of the country and calculated to disrupt one of the strongest financial institutions set up by shareholders for acceptance of deposits and making advances; is a grave interference with free enterprise; is an arbitrary and high-hand-ed method of controlling a sound institution, and unfair action against the shareholders will indirectly and adversely affect the operations of other trading banks; will enable the Government to create credit unsupported by adequate securities, initiate uneconomical industries, and lead the Dominion along the dangerous path of Slate planning of production, distribution, and exchange.” It was also unanimously resolved: “That as the acquisition of the Bank of New Zealand by the Government aims at the control of the country’s economic system, and is so far reaching in its incidence, it is clearly fundamental to all democratic principles that before any Government legislates for such a drastic change it should have a clear mandate from the people to do so. To act without such a clear mandate is adopting totalitarian methods, against which we have been waging a world war. Convinced that the Government has no such clear, specific mandate, and that the majority of people are opposed to the acouisition of the bank by the State, this meeting calls on the Government to secure an unequivocal direction from the people before passing any legislation as proposed.”