CENTRAL BANKING PLAN

Taranaki Daily News, 19 January 1933, Page 15

CENTRAL BANKING PLAN

■ EXAMPLE OF UNITED STATES. HAWERA LECTURER CRITICAL. Criticism of the central banking proposal was made by Dr. G. Smith, Hokianga, in the course of a lecture on monetary reform at Hawera on Monday. He contended that the establishment of a central bank would make reform more difficult in New Zealand. ■ . ' At the present time the Dominion, .through its control of the Bank of New Zealand, actually could control its monetary system, though it did not use that power. The money monopoly, however, knew that New Zealand was an interprising country and was nervous lest this power should be used. That was at the back of the Central Bank Bill; The Government would push it through the House and lose for the people of New Zealand all legal rights in the monetary system.

The United States, said Dr. Smith, was the home of central banking and the richest country in the world, yet it was in the worst state financially., It had been said that America’s position was due. to the loss of external trade, but that could not be, as in the record year (1929) the external trade of the United States amounted to only 7 per cent, of the total.