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Hokitika Guardian, 8 March 1933, Page 4

Tiie ravages of fire in New Zealand show very little reduction In the latest statistics available. The amount shown by the underwriters’ returns in 1924 exceeded £1,000,000, which was £250,000 more than in the previous year; in 1925, there was a reduction of £876,000, but in the following year the 1924 iceord was eclipsed land this unfavourable tendency continued until the total for 1928 reached the appalling sum of £l,B P ince then there has been ii gradual improvement, but the total! payments by underwriters still exceed £1,000,090 in. the 1931 returns. There is, u-fortunately, abundant evidence to justify the official censure that “the majority of fires are preventable an! are due to carelessness,” and the reduction during the last three years suggods that efforts to impress upo i the public tin! need for constant vigilance have not been wholly vain. ThouiA'i. the total destruction is so formidable, it is so widely distributed that few people have actual experience of ib» consequences, and there is a c nislwiit tendency to presume that Unit risk irv remote, that an insurance policy is complete protection, and that the insurance companies make large profits out of the business of saving

people from the consequences of their own negligence. Some of the uimerwriting coiupaiiic'S, by careful management and scrupulous supervision, uo conduct the bust a ecu on a remunerative basis, but the returns of all underwriting operations in 1928 showed an actual loss of £32,844,• and. even in 1931 the net profit was only £102,003'. hi tbo.e circumstances, it is idle to expect any reduction of premiums. The essential fact for property-owners to realise is that they contribute about £1,4C0,C03 for insurance against fire. This amount is barely sufficient to ( cover lossfos and the costs of efficient administration- of the insurance pool, and the annual premium payable ‘by the individual cannot be reduced until there is a constant exercise 1 everyone of greater care to prevent fire. , s