REPLY TO MINISTER.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 202, 27 July 1937, Page 5

REPLY TO MINISTER.

THE CHAMBERS’ VIEW. Further references to State trading are contained in a statement issued by the Associated Chambers of Commerce. It is a rejoinder to the actingPrime Minister, Hon. P. Fraser, who, in the statement on this page, replies tc a previously-published review by the Chambers of Commerce of State trading. “The acting-Prime Minister,” says the statement, “has replied to our review of State trading, in which he takes us to task for alleged ‘unfair’ criticism of the Government (Life) Insurance Office. The acting-Prime Minister has entirely misread the statement in question, and has erroneously taken certain comments as to Stato trading generally as being criticism directed to the particular case of the Government Insurance Office.

“In our review of Stato trading generally, • we named the directions in which tho State has of late increased its activities as a trader, we tabulated the numerous other established activities of the State in trade, we mentioned still further trading activities in which the State apparently intends to engage, and we set out certain basic considerations that concern taxpayers in the matter of State trading generally. In questioning the effectiveness of the State in business, we quoted as an instance the case of the Government Insurance Office, because this institution represents as fair an example of State competition on all fours with private enterprise as can be found among State trading concerns—many of which enjoy such special privileges over their private competitors as would prevent comparisons. “The acting-Prime Minister states that we were unfair, but immediately following the quotation by us of certain figures relative to the business of the Government Life Office, we said in our review: ‘The purpose of this examination is not to attack the Government Insurance Office, which has been fairly conducted in its competition with private offices.’ It seems inconceivable that the acting-Prime Minister could have inadvertently overlooked this essential sentence.

“The figures which were quoted in the statement were simply figures showing how the percentage of total New Zealand life insurance business held by the Government Insurance Office, when compared with the percentage held by .the non-State offices, has been steadily declining. These figures were quoted, not with the object of criticising the Government Office or its administration, but with tho object of showing the steadilygrowing tendency of the general public to choose the non-State offices. Summarised, the quoted figures showed that while the Government Life Office held in 1893 49 per cent., or nearly half, of the total New Zealand life insurance business, its holding gradually and steadily declined until in 1935 it held only 23 per cent., or somewhat under a quarter, of that business—and this in spite of the fact that the Government Insurance Office enjoys advantages over its private competitors through exemption from certain municipal rates, and through tho volume of relatively eas3 r business which should accrue to it through the influence of the State Advances Corporation. It is significant that these figures have not been challenged in any way by the acting-Prime Minister.

“Tho acting-Prime Minister brushes aside the subject of State trading in general—which was tile burden of our review—by stating that it will be •dealt with at the proper time, but we suggest that any statement by the acting-Prime Minister on our review is the proper time for him to deal with- our criticism on this important subject, which he has not done.”