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1039. Had you information of previous mortgages on this property ?—There was a mortgage to an investment company of £600. 1040. Are you aware of any application having been made for this mortgage to be increased to £800 ?—lnformation reached the office about the beginning of June respecting the mortgage, and we telegraphed and got a reply from our Besident Agent regarding it, saying that an additional amount had been declined. 1041. Have you any information as to how this application came before the Board at first ? — It was introduced by a communication from one of the gentlemen who acted as valuers. He was struck off the list of valuers directly the Board had knowledge of this transaction. I wish to add a brief explanation to my previous evidence with respect to canvassing, and my remarks that canvassing would keep down the mortality. It is the experience of British offices that the mortality amongst business which comes unsolicited is much higher than that which is solicited through the aid of canvassing. We are much more likely to get worse lives by ceasing canvassing than we would if we continued canvassing. 1042. What was the condition of the office before the Board came into existence ? —When I took over the books in 1883 they were in a great state of confusion, and shortly afterwards I discovered that the head-office Cashier had been embezzling the funds, and it took me a considerable time to get matters straight.

Mr. Geoege Fisher, M.H.E., in attendance, and examined. 1043. The Chairman.'] Will you state about when you first took your seat as a member of the Board?—Under the Act the Board itself was supposed to come into existence on the 1st January, 1885; but we formally met for the first time on the 23rd January. 1044. You are an elected member ?—Yes. 1045. Will you state what was your view of the condition of the management of the business of the association when you first became acquainted with it: was it satisfactory in all respects or not ?—As to the working-staff it was satisfactory. There was, and is, a defect at the head. 1046. Can you particularize in what direction ?—I should put it generally as a want of business capacity. 1047. You are now referring to the management ?—Yes. 1048. Did you find any material points, such as the manner in which lives were being obtained, or investments made, requiring reform?—No. As to the manner of getting lives—that is, new business—that remains the same. There is no fault to be found with that. The question of investments rests not so much with the managerial head as with the Board itself; and I feel bound to say generally that I think the Board has failed to manifest a proper conception of the largeness of the functions and responsibilities intrusted to it. Especially do I think it has manifested a want of understanding of the investment-side of its business. I have frequently endeavoured to induce the Board to more particularly devote some portion of its attention to this branch of its business ; and I am bound to say, at the end of the year and a half's experience, that the results connected with that side of the business of the association have not been satisfactory. I regard that as being of almost equal importance to the primary business of the association itself, because it is the judicious investment of the association's funds which produces to the policy-holders the bonus or dividend which every investor in a mutual life office looks for and is entitled, to look for. One of the reasons which induce people to insure in other associations or companies is, that they get large bonuses upon the amount insured. We compare in that respect very unfavourably with the Australian Mutual Provident Society, which distributes annual bonuses amongst its policyholders. 1049. Will you state as briefly as you can the mode of operation of the Board with regard to investments? —The mode of application is cumbrous and circumlocutory, and many applicants for loans have had to abandon their applications, after initiating them, because of the many forms to be gone through. An applicant has to fill in his application form. That has to wait for a week for consideration by the Finance Committee. Valuers are then appointed. The application itself, if recommended by the Finance Committee, has to go before the Board; and so time is, I think, unnecessarily and tediously eaten up. 1050. How would you recommend the system to be simplified ?—I should have it very considerably shortened, by giving the Manager power to appoint a valuer at once. In connection with that point, I think the Board ought to have, in all parts of the colony, reliable valuators from whom it could immediately and confidently select. At the present time—and this is one of the wants of management, as I term it—we have to take up haphazard, as it were, a valuator in any particular district. It is true we have on our books a list of three or four, perhaps more, valuators in different districts from whom we may select; but the Board is in the position that, excepting in one or two rare cases, it does not sufficiently understand the character and capacity and reliability of the valuers, so that it might immediately appoint in the way I suggest. 1051. Is not the Board always in the position of possibly employing a valuer who might have special interest in the application or might influence the application; or would that be generally remedied by the information you get from your resident agents ? —I have frequently suggested at meetings of the Board that, in order to perfect the investment branch of the association, we should have picked out in each principal division of the colony some man of standing and integrity who should be regarded as our loan agent, or through whom loan applications from his part of the colony should come, and who should also have placed at his disposal a reliable and competent valuator, so that there should be no loss of time in passing through the preliminary forms in connection with the granting of loans. Instead of adopting that course, we now drift about, taking from our list one valuer for to-day and another for to-morrow, to give them a turn, as it were. That I hold