“SUICIDAL POLICY.”

Gisborne Times, Volume LXVIII, Issue 10742, 13 November 1928, Page 5

“SUICIDAL POLICY.”

SIR J. WARD’S LOAN SCHEME

AIR COLEMAN DISSECTS FIGURES.

The £70,000,000 loan scheme presented to the electors by Sir Joseph Ward, Leader of the United Partv, was interestingly dissected by Mr D. W. Coleman,'Labor candidate for the Gisborne seat, in his final address locally in the Opera House last night. “Sir Joseph Ward’s loan of £'70.,000.000 to be floated at £95, means that we would be giving the. moneylenders £3,500,000;’’ said Mr Coleman. Brokerage, bank charges and other expenses would absorb at least 6no per cent., which means another £700,000. At the most the people of Now Zealand would receive £ be,800.COO, and pay interest at the rate of 4) pei- cent, on £70, 000,00c 1 . Brokerage, bank charges and expenses on the £70,000,000 would be £700,000 which is a very conservative estimate. This amount would employ 2692 men for 12 months at £5 a week, or. in other words, would pav the salaries of the members of Parliament for at least twenty-one years at £4OO. a , year each. As this loan was to be used over a period of 10 years, he estimated that the monev would l>e used at the rate of £6,580,000 per year. Therefore, interest would be paid at the rate, of 4£ per cent, for the next 32 vears <'n £6,580.000, nlus brokerage and other expenses £700,000, plus £5 lost in cverv £IOO on the £70,000.000 equalling £3,500.000, and making a total of £10,780,000. The interest on the first year’s instalment and charges over 32 . years would ho £154523.100, while the addition of interest for the successive nine veavs would bring the total that .would be paid in this respect to £87,675.500. With the addition of the original capital borrowed, the total would come to £157,675,500. r „ , “You will see,” - added Mr Coleman. “that we you Id actually pay £157.675,500 for the loan of . £65,800,000, and J would point out that with other loans that are redeemable in this period, and the interest that has got to be met 011 our national debt, the outlay would be colossal and almost beyond comprehension. The loans to be redeemable during the next three years aggregate £pr 681,280, while those redeemable between 1931 and 1941 total £39,003--420. so the total of such loans in the next fourteen years would be £45,684.700. “It seems to me,” Air Coleman continued, “that it is a very poor proposition, as it would mean that file Dominion would be burdened down beyond comprehension, I know that peonle think that the loan scheme will bring prosperity. Imt 1 assure them that it would he only fictitious and temporary, and. when the bubble, burst, New Zealand would be in an infinitely yorse position that ever before; in fact it would w a suicidal policy for the Dominion.