TELLING THE HENS ALL ABOUT THE SILVER QUESTION.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 370, 11 March 1932, Page 6

TELLING THE HENS ALL ABOUT THE SILVER QUESTION.

To-day’s Special Article

Canadian View of the Distractions Adding to Trouble of World To-day.

Mr Miller Lash, K.C., a director of the Canadian Bank of Commerce, speaking at the annual meeting of shareholders of the bank in Toronto in January caused amusement by his satirical references to those people who go about giving advice on the subject of the depression. Of course, Mr Lash had Canada in mind particularly, but much of what he said applies to New Zealand as well as to Canada.

M R MILLER LASH said: “It is my pleasant duty to-day on behalf of the shareholders to move a vote of thanks to the general manager and the staff of the bank for their services during the past “In a period of depression such as this there is a great deal more difficulty in carrying on one’s daily work than is ordinarily the case. I think that is particularly true of the staff of .a bank, on account of the intimate touch they have with the troubles of the community. “ In addition to the troubles that arise in the actual carrying out of their work, they are subject to outside distractions nowadays, the chief of which seems to me to be the enormous flood of advice and opinion that is poured out on all of us by so-called financial experts or economists, most of which does not seem to us roughnecks to have much practical application. The written stuff we can avoid by not reading it, but we are all more or less familiar with the man with a glare in his eye who insists on telling us all about the Silver Question for instance, touching lightly at the same time on Manchuria and Reparations, Invisible Imports and things lik£ that. It is all very impressive unless one happens to have read the same magazine article that he has. “ To illustrate what I mean: A customer of the bank in a rural district comes to see the manager about a note that is falling due. He tells the manager that he cannot pay the note, because there is something the matter with his hens. There has been a good deal of talk about the economic importance of hens; I think just lately there was an editorial in one of the morning papers about it. lie said there was

something the matter with his hens, they used to lay eggs worth 30 or 40 cents a dozen, now they are laying eggs worth only five or ten cents. He wanted to know what to do about it. Of course the manager does not know, but he has just had a little lecture given to him by someone on the Silver Question, so he tells the customer all about the Silver Question. The customer is much impressed and he goes home and tells the hens all about it. The Canadian hen is all fed up on the Silver Question, and it does not do any good. “ I am told that the hens in Belgium are in difficulties too. Until recently Belgium exported to France about 275 million eggs a year. Or perhaps it was 275 million dozen. Anyway it was several eggs. Now France has restricted the importation of eggs. I understand they are passing some Orders-in-Council about it in Belgium, but I do not believe the hens will pay any attention to them. “ The worries of the staff are also added to in another direction, that is because in some circles there is a tendency to blame everything on the banks, or the banking system. If a man’s wife has too many children, or his livestock not enough of them, he blames it on the banking system at once. “ We are told that the best brains of the world are working towards a solution of all these things. Well most of us have a feeling that it was the best brains of the world working overtime that got us into this complicated mess. I think they ought to get us out of it. “ Perhaps the only real solution is for all of us who are fortunate enough to have a job to go on with it as well as we can, efficiently if possible, at any rate diligently and loyally.”