[To rat EDITOR or THE " SPECTATOR.")
SIR,—In your article of January 19th upon " Premium Bonds" you applaud Sir Robert Kindersley's objections to the scheme.
1 believe his objections and your own to be wrong, but I am not
welting to combat them, as the matter has been decided for the present by the Report of the Committee. Upon one point of your objection, however, I must ask you to allow me to comment.
Your remarks are so staggering thereupon that I can only suppose that, as financiers occasionally write literary articles, a
reviewer has in this instance tried his prentice hand upon finance.
He writes that " the greater part of this money [r240,000,000 War Savings Certificates and £250,000,000 in the Savings Banks] is on call," and a very large proportion of this would be withdrawn to
invest in premium bonds; there would merely be the heavy trouble of handing out money " already invested " (sic) in order
that it might be reinvested in another shape. This statement is one " the imagination boggles at." Money " at call," it appears, is " already invested," and that the Government should obtain the funding for ten years, or possibly longer, of nearly £500,000,000, or "a very large proportion " of it, now repayable at call, is " merely trouble " ! One's breath is taken away in reading the serious setting forth of so grotesque a point of view.—I am, Sir,
&c., BONUS. [With all respect to our correspondent, his authority as
financier is no greater than that of Sir Robert Kindersley, or whose statements our article was based. His point that money
now " on call " is not " invested " is largely a verbal one. The obvious meaning of the passage to which our correspondent refers was that old savings rather than new savings would be drawr upon to invest in premium bonds. It is true that the nee investment would in most cases be for a longer period than the old, but that does not dispose of our argument; for the investor in premium bonds would be able to borrow upon them for a fresh fling.—ED. Spectator.]
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