NO ADEQUATE REASON FOR £2 NOTES, SAYS MR NASH

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 October 1948, Page 4

NO ADEQUATE REASON FOR £2 NOTES, SAYS MR NASH

(P.A.) ' WELLINGTON, This Day. Replying by letter to a suggestion by Mr A. M. Finlay (Government, North Shore) that Reserve Bank notes of £ 2 face value might be issued the Minister of Finance (Mr Nash) states: . “The only justification, as I see it, for including £2 notes in our issue would be to meet a definite public want, but there is no evidence of any general desire for such an additional denomination.”

The Minister said the matter had been examined both from the aspect of economy and of service to the business community, but any economy was more likely to be in the administrative field than in a reduced cost of maintaining the note issue. The Minister said the £2 note would require to be received with enthusiasm before any marked economy could be counted upon. The introduction of the two-dollar note in Canada and the United States failed to affect materially the demand for the single dollar note, so that no effective economy in supply resulted.

Mr Nash recalled that in the early days of New Zealand £2 notes were issued by the Union Bank of Australia, but the issue was soon discontinued, and had been out of circulation for many years.