RATES OF INTEREST.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXV, Issue 4254, 3 July 1895, Page 4

RATES OF INTEREST.

Writing on the subject of interest charged on loans the "Wanganui Herald " says : "The Hastings Knights of Labor have been considering and discussing the question of interest, and have come to the common sense conclusion that if a Eair Eent Act is passed by the Legislature to adjust rents from time to time in accordance with existing conditions, it is equally necessary that a similar law should be enacted to adjust interest, so that where the latter exceeds what . would be deemed a fair rent it shall be reduced to that level. One of the first things Parliament should do during the approaching session is to pass a Usury Act, making it illegal to charge more than 10 per cent per annum on any loan, as there are harpies who prey upon small traders and others who require temporary loans which they cannot obtain from the ordinary financial sources. These impecunious ones have to pay through the nose, so to speak, for these small, short dated loans, and it is not uncommon for them to be charged interest equal to from 50 to 100 per cent per annum. Once a person geta into the hands of these usurious human vampires it is 100 to 1 the latter never letß go his hold until he has sucked his victim dry and left him stripped of everything, except the clothes he stands up iv, In many such cases the family home with its contents are swallowed up and the family cast

adrift upon the world to sink or swim j while the usurious mouey-lender re- j coups himself tenfold, as by fines aud renewals the original loan has swollen up until all the unfortunate borrower has in the world is seized by his relentless, avaricious creditor to satisfy his outrageous claims."