FOREIGN SYNDICATES. ELECTRIC TRAMS, AND BORROWING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 9832, 29 May 1895, Page 6

FOREIGN SYNDICATES. ELECTRIC TRAMS, AND BORROWING.

I TO THE EDITOR. Sib,As yon have been, and still are. a (insistent opponent of excessive borrowing, lay I crave permission, through the agency if the Herald, to ask the City Council t« onsider deeply and well the proposition d the syndicate to carry out an electric tram iystem for the city of Auckland, combined with an electric "lighting scheme? Individually I am opposed to neither, bat to the nethod of raising the necessary capital I :ertainly am. As the proposed method tvould, if adopted, increase the annual imount of interest we have to send Home, ivhich at present is a serious enough load for :he people to bear, I desire to call the attendee of the City Council to the practice now so common in France, and also in Melbourne —for the Metropolitan Board of Works aire aow carrying out their draic-agi! scheme on the same system of issuing local loans in small sums of from £5 debentures and upwards, and which are readily c&ken up by small investors. I think the City Council should make a beginning in this matter, construct the trams and carry out a lighting scheme on a local loan, or form a tramway trust, as they have done in Melbourne, giving v guarantee to the trust, and thus enabling it » raise the money cheaply, easily, and lcally. There is no good reason why the .Auckland Savings Ba.nk should not ranee tb money on so safe a security as the City Council's guarantee, and thus make use, diftctly, of the savings of the people for the beefit of the people.—l am, etc, Ratatohosia. dura Galley, May 20, 1895.