INSURING THE CORONATION.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 120, 6 May 1911, Page 1 (Supplement)

INSURING THE CORONATION.

The Odds Laid at Lloyd’s. A postponement of the Coronation would mean a heavy loss to many mancfacturers and shopkeepers. Already innumerable English warehouses, particularly London warehouses, are filling up with goods a great part *of which would become practically valueless if the Coronation did not take place on the appointed date. But it is possible to insure against such calamities, and this peculiar sort of insurance is, underwriters say. being taken advantage of this year more than ever.

They are asking a 20 per cent, premium, so that for every £2O handed over now to the underwriters at Lloyd’s £lOO will be recovered if the Coronation is put off. Most people know that King Edward was heavily insured by tradespeople raid commercial men. Even before the public learner] how grave his last illness was. the insurance premium had jumped to 30 per cent. When he died, ever a third of a million changed hands. Not only Lloyd’s, but some 50 insurance companies were interested, though there are a few firms which refuse this sort of business.

But the insurance people were not heavily hit as one might suppose, for most of the policies on King Edvard’s life had been taken out when fie was very young and was the Duke of Cornwall —largely by tenants of the Duchy with copyhold leases, or leases that expire when tho person named fn them dies. So that the insurance Arms had already received more in premiums than they had to pay out.

It is for a similar reason that the young Prince of Wales, being Duke of Cornwall, is already heavilv insured in the districts forming the Duchy. But neither King Edward, nor King George, nor the young Prince of Wales has ever had so much money hanging on his life as had Queen Victoria. This sort of insurance was unheard of till her accession, bitt she looked so delicate that it soon became popular. Tho Insurance companies demanded—as they have always done since in the ease of royalties—a premium about half js large again as an ordinary case, owing to the fact that they could not, of course, hare her examined by their medical officers. About half the London theatres insured her. Owing to the length of her reign they only recovered in the end abcut a third of what they had paid in premiums. ’ When the insurance companies have taken as much ns they care for they pass the overflow on to Lloyd’s. And at is Lloyd’s that do all the Coronation Insurance. It is all done in that famous long low room (says “Pearson’s IVeekly”), known all over the world as '''Die Room ” There is a line of pews, Called “Loxes,” down either side, each pew containing a narrow writing table. In each sits an underwriter and his clerks. An insurance broker’s clerk walks round the room. His firm may l-.ave had a coinmi-s’on to insure against the postponement of the Coronation for, say, £5OOO at 20 per cent, fie stops at one table and shows tho “slip.” The underwriter there jots his name down for a thousand of the total. At the next table the clerk may find an underwriter willing to be responsible lor £5OO at the suggested premium. . And so the clerk goes from box to box Idl the whole sum is underwritten. All • big responsibilities are shared in this way. All sorts of oncer risks can be Insured against in “Tlie Room.” Some months ago a prominent business man who was a Lout to undergo an operation under chloroform paid a 5 per cent, premium against tho chance of a fatal termination.

ft is an old joke that an underwriter once got insured by a colleague against the risk' of his wif-> having twin*. As far back as th." 18th century there was n Jot of betting done at Lloyd’s on captured highwaymen’s chances of escaping the gallows. Though underwriters have not the guarantee of the "hole house behind them as have members of the Stock Exchange, there is a bill in Parliament pi*t now to give it them. But even Without that an underwriter’s financial Soundness can be counted on. for hefore he is accepted as. a member of 'The Room,” lie has not only to undergo a searching examination into his career, but to make a deposit, the minimum hein"- So th" Coronation money is pretty safe.