6 OCTOBER 1989: SCU33: RICHARD RAXWORTHY TALKING TO KEITH YOUNG
I will ask you first Mr Keith Young, where were you born and when?
KY: In Mosman in 1926.
What were your parents, your father?
KY: He had hired cars, very popular in those days.
Did he operate it as a taxi business or just straight hire cars?
KY: Just straight hire cars.
He managed to carry on through the Depression?
KY: Yes he managed to keep food on the table.
What sort of influence did he have on you?
KY: Not a great deal.
Religious influence?
KY: No, none at all.
Not your mother either?
KY: Only very slightly.
Your schooling?
KY: Mostly at Mosman, we spent all our childhood at Mosman. The Mosman Infants School, Mosman Primary School and Mosman Intermediate High.
When you were there what did you like at school, what did you dislike?
KY: Bit hard to say it is so long ago. I was never sort of excellent at anything really, just a Jack of all trades.
But you didn’t really dislike anything.
KY: No.
You went through your schooling at Mosman. What was your first job then?
KY: I went to work with the Official Liquidator when I left school. I was there for only a matter of eighteen months. Then in July 1943 I went to work for what was then the Colonial Sugar.
What were the main influences on you in your younger days do you think?
KY: Well certainly my two years in the airforce was an influence, be it for good or bad. It was during the latter part of my time in the airforce that I sort of became involved with the Anglican Church at Mosman and notably Bishop Hume Moir and that sort of set the tone for the rest of my life.
Was it something about Moire or was it more Christianity as such?
KY: Well B P Hume Moir was a giant of a man. He was a men amongst men and he had a tremendous influence on a lot of chaps, including me. I sort of came into the Christian faith really due to his influence.
Now what sort of recreation did you have when you were young?
KY: The usual things, swimming and tennis and it is now bowls. A bit of golf in between, but it is bowls as the main thing now.
So you went to work at CSR. Were you involved in union affairs at all?
KY: Yes I was always involved. CSR had a union which covered all CSR staff irrespective of what they did. It sounds very funny when you hear the latest news last night that they are talking about one union in one place. This was precisely what CSR had and I was always a member of the CSR Officers’ Association, which was our federal union.
What about political involvement?
KY: Never been actively engaged politically, although I suppose my leanings would be towards the Liberal Party. I have sort of handed out leaflets and that sort of thing.
Did that come from your father, or was it a personal choice?
KY: No, I think it largely stems from involvement with the Young Liberals back in my younger days.
When you were working at CSR what was your job?
KY: A clerk, which covered all sorts of things, bookkeeping, accountancy, pay-rolls and these types of things.
What about in the airforce, what did you do there?
KY: I was a Pay Clerk. I have always been a ‘bean counter’, always involved with money. Chairborne and not airborne as they used to say.
You didn’t meet anybody like Jack Banninster while you were in the airforce?
KY: I don’t recall any credit union people in the airforce.
Owen Jones came from the airforce as well. So what led you towards credit union affairs?
KY: Well after leaving Mosman in 1950, when we got married at the end of 1950, my wife and I moved to Balgowlah and there we joined the local Anglican Church, All Saints, Balgowlah. It was about 1952 that I came under the influence, you might say, of a fellow called John Reynolds, who in actual fact went to the Anglican Church at Narrabeen, St Faith’s, Narrabeen. The Minister at St Faith’s was a fellow called the Reverend Osborne-Brown. Bill Osborne-Brown had a credit union.
What year was that then?
KY: That would be about 1952. So what we did we invited Osborne-Brown to come up and address a meeting of parishioners at All Saints, Balgowlah, somewhere around 1952. He outlined what the plan and purpose of the credit unions were, the fact of the congregation sharing their meagre possessions, their money, and making low cost loans to each other. You know the usual credit union philosophy. Anyway it was decided that we would push ahead and do that and I think it was in 1952 that the West Manly Anglican Savings and Loans Society, as it was then known, was formed. So we had this little parish credit union underway.
Do you know what the background of the other credit union was? Where did they get the idea so to speak?
KY: Osborne-Brown was a great co-operator, in its true sense and it was not only just the credit union. But I think Osborne-Brown, although he wouldn’t admit it, was probably very much influenced by what he heard was happening in the Roman Catholic churches around the Antigonish movement and these sorts of things. Not only did they sort of have a money aspect, which the credit union was, but they were also involved in co-operative buying. Although at West Manly we never got involved in that, we stuck strictly to a credit union operation.
Did you every meet Father Gallagher?
KY: I can’t remember ever meeting Father Gallagher, although in those days his name loomed high and bright in everything. I have spoken to him on the phone, but I can’t really remember that I have ever met him. I have met his sister Rose, but never Father John.
Well she is still running the Lidcombe Credit Union. I phoned the other day and got her on the phone. She couldn’t speak because she had too many returns to get in for the end of the month. I had never heard of the Australian Antigonish Association, which apparently he founded.
KY: Oh yes there was quite a group of active credit unions around Lidcombe, Berala, and all out that way. They would never co-operate with any moves to form a State association.
Well how did Dermot Ryan become a League Director from that credit union at Lidcombe then?
KY: Well this is getting on a bit now. We are getting further on. When the League was formed, and I was the Secretary of the League, we did make offers to every credit union to become members of the League. For some reason which I am not aware of we certainly struck a responsive cord with Lidcombe Credit Union. I can remember on several occasions going out and speaking to meetings at Lidcombe, at the Lidcombe Credit Union, and also the Punchbowl Credit Union, with Clarrie Murphy. So Punchbowl, which wasn’t really in the Antigonish business, and Lidcombe which was, really broke away in this sense and came and joined the League.
Really it was an educational as well as co-operative union wasn’t it?
KY: Oh yes.
All right, let’s not jump ahead then. So you had formed the West Manly Savings and Loans Society at that time. You and who else?
KY: Oh just a group of parishioners. We got together a little Board of Directors.
Can you remember who they were?
KY: Oh, no, it is all far gone now. The West Manly Anglican Credit Union in actual fact has folded up. We folded up many, many years ago.
But you didn’t have any papers on it to keep the historical thing alive?
KY: No. When we moved away in 1960, I just passed everything in relation to the credit union over to the new Secretary of the time.
Ah, so somebody has got them somewhere.
KY: Ah yes. I wouldn’t know where they would be, but I would have thought it would be at least ten or twelve years since the West Manly Anglican Savings and Loans Society went into liquidation.
But it is good to keep it alive in the sense with some papers too.
KY: I can certainly tell you the name of the fellow who was the last Secretary. His name was Bob Kingsmill.
I have heard that name somewhere?
KY: He comes from Balgowlah. This is the West Manly, All Saints Anglican Church, Balgowlah.
So would he still be a member of that would you think?
KY: I think he is, yes.
Well I might put a letter out to see if he has papers and he might put them into the Mitchell Library. Because there is really a dearth of manuscripts and general printed material and roneoed sheets and that sort of thing of the credit union movement. There just isn’t the stuff there. Most people seem to have flung most of it out. I would like to alert a few of them to hang on to what is left and sort of reconstruct them. Because lots of people probably would have little things at home. Did you have a little newsletter?
KY: I can’t specifically remember that we had a newsletter, no. When we wanted to advertise we simply advertised through the weekly church bulletin.
That is the All Saints, Balgowlah bulletin?
KY: Yes.
That was called The Bulletin was it?
KY: Something of that nature. Everybody had a weekly notice sheet of some description.
So you don’t really remember the name of it. So what do you remember happening next? You still ran that one?
KY: Well by the time we got underway there were a few credit unions. We will use the term credit union because that is what it has now become bearing in mind in those days they were savings and loans societies. There were credit unions operating in a few Anglican churches, a few Anglican parishes. Narrabeen was one, which I have mentioned, there was West Manly, Balgowlah, where we were.
This was 1952 wasn’t it?
KY: Yep. There was one at St Mark’s Granville and there were several others. We formed an association. We were the first registered association of credit unions in New South Wales. I think we were known as the Association of Anglican Credit Unions. The Association of Anglican Credit Unions didn’t last that long because when the New South Wales Credit Union League was formed, we liquidated. We all joined as it was to become the New South Wales Credit Union League.
That was in 1956 wasn’t it.
KY: 1956.
When did you first become involved with the League?
KY: Well my first involvement with the League was not only because of my position as Secretary of the West Manly Anglican Credit Union, but in 1956 I was instrumental in forming the first industrial credit union in New South Wales and that was at the CSR.
That was also in 1956?
KY: That was in 1956. We have just had our Thirty-third Annual General Meeting, last week. What happened in regard to that was I used to work for CSR out of Alexandria, and we had a little lunch room. We all used to sit there and eat our lunch and people used to talk about what they were up to and so forth and so on and I happened to mention that we had formed a credit union in the local parish church. The Manager at the time said, ‘If this credit union is so good operating in the parish why can’t we start one, or why can’t you start one for CSR staff?’ I said to him, ‘Well, I am prepared to have a strike if you will give me half a day off to do something about it.’ He said, ‘Yes, you can have tomorrow afternoon off to go to head office in town and see what you can do.’ So I came to town the next afternoon and I sought out a friend who I knew was on the executive of the CSR Officers’ Association, which was the union. He said, ‘What’s on your mind?’ I said, ‘This is the story,’ and told him about the credit union and how I happened to be there. He said, ‘It sounds good to me. If I can get the executive of the Association together at four o’clock this afternoon will you tell us about this credit union?’ I said I would. So at four o’clock a meeting of the Association executive was held and I outlined what a credit union was, what we were doing in the parish. The executive decided there and then they would immediately move to form a credit union within CSR. So the whole thing got underway and as I say the CSR Officers’ Credit Union was formed in 1956. I served as a Director of that right up until 1977, when I was seconded from CSR to become the full-time Manager of the credit union. It was during my seven or eight years with the credit union that the whole thing really blossomed and took off. It is now a $10 million credit union. But in 1956 of course, as I say, I had the joint interest of being the Secretary of the West Manly Anglican Credit Union and also a Director of the CSR Officers’ Credit Union as a result of those two hats. I was involved in the very first meetings to form the New South Wales Credit Union League in 1956. As a result of the formation of the New South Wales Credit Union League in 1956, I became the first Secretary.
Right. Do you remember that formation meeting?
KY: I certainly do, yes.
Do you remember how you heard about it first off?
KY: Well all the credit unions at that time were circulated and told there were distinct advantages in having a united voice.
Who did the circulating?
KY: Well people like Bill Egan, I don’t know what happened to him. Kevin Yates was a leading light, he has since died. Kevin Yates was reputed to be the man who first brought credit unions to Australia, certainly to New South Wales and of course was involved in the Universal Credit Union, which was a Roman Catholic credit union. He was also a part of the Co-operative Institute. So I think it was largely due to the influence of Kevin Yates and the Co-operative Institute that the credit unions were circulated, were invited to a meeting to discuss the formation of a State association. I remember this was held in the Canadian Club down at Elizabeth Street because Kevin was married to a Canadian and they had very strong ties with the Canadian situation. That is where the first meeting was held and we all talked about it and it was decided that we would proceed. The formation meeting of the League was held in the Railway Institute at Central Railway.
Right. The Canadian Club was where?
KY: Down Elizabeth Street. It has since gone, many years ago.
Who else was there apart from Kevin Yates?
KY: Tom Kelly, Clarrie Murphy, just a few of the notables who were there at that time.
Not Stan Arneil?
KY: No. Stan Arneil didn’t come into the situation until some years later, at the point when the ABC credit unions were formed. That would have been very close to about 1960 or 1961, before the ABC credit unions were formed.
Was that the period when he started having all sorts of meetings and forming up all sorts of credit unions all over the place?
KY: I think that activity really came about when Stan went to work for the Registry. You see after forming the ABC credit unions not only in New South Wales but around the other States, Stan then became active in the New South Wales Credit Union League. Then sometime after that, which must have been in the mid-1960s, Stan went to work for the Co-operative Registry, as it then was, acting as an adviser and sort of participating in the formation of credit unions. From there, I understand, he went to work for CUNA Mutual Insurance.
I didn’t realise that he was there?
KY: Oh yes he was employed.
So about when do you think he started the ABC credit unions?
KY: I would have thought it was around about 1960, give or take a year one way or the other.
So it would be the Co-operative Registry?
KY: It was the Co-operative Registry.
So he was going around helping people to form the credit unions?
KY: I understand that he was acting as a sort of credit union adviser. Helping to form credit unions, speaking at meetings and generally promoting the credit union idea.
That explains something that I didn’t realise. So while you were at the League you were Secretary?
KY: I was Secretary of the League.
So who do you remember there at that time?
KY: Well Jack Ward was the President. He at that time was the General Manager of the St George Building Society. Quite a number of the credit unions in the formation of the League were in actual fact associated with building societies. A lot of people saw this as being a bit difficult. Quite clearly the concept of credit unions within the Antigonish movement was quite opposed to credit unions being formed and run by building societies. But, however, they were significant in the formation and Jack Ward, who was a powerful man in the building society industry, was the first Chairman of the New South Wales Credit Union League.
I know that. Who else do you remember?
KY: Well as I say Clarrie Murphy was there. Certainly Tom Kelly.
Did you get on very well with them all?
KY: Oh yes.
No friction?
KY: No friction. I have never had friction. There have been torrid times in the credit union movement, personality clashes and so forth, but I can honestly say that I have never been in cahoots or in clashes with any one.
You never had any clashes with Stan Arneil?
KY: No, not really. I suppose we agreed to differ at times. But I was never really in a position where I was working for him. As I say at the time when he became the Chairman of the Credit Union League in 1962, was the time that I retired as Secretary. So really Stan and I have never worked together.
I know it is a bit premature, but exactly why did you retire as Secretary then?
KY: Well, I suppose the thing was I was married, I had three young children and I was Secretary of the West Manly Anglican Credit Union. I was Secretary of the State League and I was trying to keep down a full-time job at CSR. It was all just becoming too much. Our home at Balgowlah was the registered office of the New South Wales Credit Union League. Then in December 1960 we moved from Balgowlah to Lindfield and here again our home at Lindfield became the registered office. But however it was only a year or so after our move to Lindfield that the League decided that we were getting a bit beyond this sort of business and they in actual fact rented premises up in Devonshire Street, which became the registered office of the New South Wales Credit Union League. It was at that time they decided they should have a full-time Manager and the position was advertised. There were a number of applicants, I was one of them, but I withdrew my application at the eleventh hour. As a result of that Clarrie Murphy became the first Manager of the New South Wales Credit Union League. What we haven’t mentioned of course is that in 1958, in the early part of 1958, Clarrie Murphy and myself went overseas for six months as guests of the Credit Union National Association in the United States. We undertook a six months course of activity. Really the result of that trip, and is recorded in the Minutes here of the meeting we had at Hurstville where we reported on our trip, a number of things flowed from it. The adoption of the name credit union as opposed to these other names that were floating around and just the general tone and direction of the future League was sort of set at that time.
So you were very much central if the office was actually in your house. Very much central to everything at that time. When did things sort of start to change?
KY: Well I think the first big significant step of course was the establishment of the office at Devonshire Street and the appointment of Clarrie Murphy as the first Manager. After that there was quite a move forward, with new credit unions being formed. It seemed to be the era when credit unions were much in vogue and lots of credit unions were formed. Although I resigned in 1962, I still remained as a delegate to the League from the CSR Credit Union. But that didn’t last very long because the CSR Credit Union decided to leave the League. That might have been about 1963 or 1964.
Did you have anything to do with that?
KY: Not specifically. Because of my previous background I would have dearly liked to have stayed in. But the Directors of the CSR Credit Union felt there was no purpose to be served by staying in the League at that time for various reasons. One I understand, I feel, was an argument over the distribution of surpluses from loan protection insurance, which I had been instrumental in getting the League to take on. There were bonuses coming from that and the League decided, I think, to keep the bonuses and not to share them amongst the participating credit unions. I guess this was the straw that broke the camel’s back that CSR decided that they would leave. So CSR Credit Union was unaffiliated in the movement for a number of years.
They didn’t just decide did they? I mean it was decided at a meeting that they would keep the surpluses in?
KY: Oh the Directors decided they would retain the surpluses and advised the credit unions. The CSR Board decided if that was what was going to happen they would pull out of the League.
Yes, but it did happen at a League meeting?
KY: Yes.
But later on there was a further argument. I don’t know if you were involved in that at all or heard anything about it. They wanted to establish a Stabilisation Fund.
KY: No, that all transpired after I had moved out of the front line.
But were you still a delegate to the League?
KY: No, not at that point.
Because CSR had withdrawn?
KY: Yes, we would have withdrawn from the League about 1962, or at the very latest 1963.
What about West Manly were they still in or not?
KY: Well of course in 1960 we left West Manly and so therefore I had nothing to do with West Manly after 1960. So I don’t know what they did.
Was there anything else important that you remember during that period?
KY: Well I think one of the important things was the establishment of loan protection insurance. This was a concept Clarrie Murphy and I brought back from the United States in 1958. The old saying that the loan dies with the borrower. We managed to get the League Board at that time to agree that we ought to have loan protection insurance. A proposal was prepared and this was sort of carted around to most of the insurance companies. Eventually it was only the MLC that were happy to take on this arrangement and so we had a packaged deal. The League had the contract with MLC and all the participating credit unions used to send in their monthly returns and their monthly cheques. So what happened afterwards as far as CUNA Mutual is concerned and all the rest of it, that is a story of which I know very little about. At the time I was involved certainly we had a very successful loan protection system running with MLC.
What about general insurance, they hadn’t taken that on?
KY: No. It was up to the individual. Some credit unions had some general insurance agencies, but certainly the movement was not involved.
Did the League act as an agent for life insurance for members as well?
KY: Not at that time, no.
So it was just the loan protection insurance so that the loan died with the member?
KY: Bearing in mind in the late 1950s and early 1960s credit unions were terribly simplistic operations. Nobody was really employed full-time by credit unions. They were all run by volunteers. It is only in later years of course that credit unions have moved out into the areas where they are at the moment. Certainly up to the middle of the 1960s they were very simple things.
When you were in America was there any wind of the insurance controversy over there at that time?
KY: Oh yes, there was no doubt about that. We hadn’t been in the United States for twenty-four hours before we were fully appraised that there was unbelievable friction between the credit union national association, which was the National Credit Union Movement, and the CUNA Mutual Insurance Society. Such words as that the National Credit Union had created a Frankenstein. The size and the magnitude of CUNA Mutual Insurance was awe-inspiring. Really the national association was a Mickey Mouse organisation compared to this Frankenstein that they had created, this CUNA Mutual Insurance Society. We of course thought of getting CUNA Mutual out here, but the insurance laws at that time did not permit us to do this. Exchange regulations and so forth and so on. That is why in the late 1950s, early 1960s, we were forced to establish loan protection insurance with a local life company, because CUNA Mutual couldn’t get in. They did later on of course.
I understand that one of the reasons, I was told, they got in was that they were encouraged by the fact that Dermot Ryan and Ken Miller had supported CUNA Mutual in that resolution the year they went over there.
KY: They could have. These are all later politics which I must confess I don’t know anything about.
They said at the time, talking to Ken Miller, that if they had told them what they were up to in the first instance they would have voted for them. But in actual fact they didn’t tell them so they ended up being the balance of power that voted against them.
KY: It was in 1958 that Clarrie Murphy and I were in the United States that we attended the Annual Meeting of the Credit Union National Association in that year. It was in that particular meeting that the CUNA, as they were called, decided to accept world-wide membership. It was as a result of that meeting, and our being there, that the New South Wales Credit Union League was accepted into membership of the world-wide movement.
Were you involved at all in the idea of setting up a World Council rather than being accepted into the American national movement?
KY: No this is all history beyond me. At the time of our involvement all we were interested in was the New South Wales credit union movement being admitted into what was then the United States National Association.
Well that again tallies with what Ken Miller said. He said, as far as they were concerned they were the ones that originally voiced the opinions that they shouldn’t be carrying votes for the American National Congress. So what should we have discussed? Is there more during this period? What about the involvement in trying to get the taxes lifted from credit unions?
KY: Yes that was a hot issue in my day, the fact that credit unions in a sense became taxed. I can well remember that we engaged a taxation consultant.
Which was who, can you remember?
KY: I can’t remember. May well be in the Minutes. We engaged a tax consultant and he and I and one or two others appeared before a Commonwealth Taxation Board of Review. It was at that time that basically the system was changed to accommodate the tax laws. Up until this point every dollar in the credit union was treated as shares. The point was the dividends and so forth and so on were all taxable. So the idea was put forward as a way out of this whole situation to change, which did happen, that is that everybody only had a minimum number of shares, i.e. $10 in shares in the credit union, and all the rest of the money he had in the credit union was treated as deposits. The interest paid on those deposits was treated as an expense. So credit unions were really only being taxed on the dividend, on the small number of shares, and not on the total issue. Obviously other things have happened on the tax front since then, but certainly that was a very significant break-through.
End Tape 1A
6 OCTOBER 1989: SCU33: RICHARD RAXWORTHY TALKING TO KEITH YOUNG
That was initiated by whom?
KY: It would have all come from the League Board.
Were you instrumental in initiating that?
KY: Well I suppose in a sense I was, yes. But obviously something had to be done because the tax situation could have effectively destroyed the whole movement. We had to establish this business of mutuality and so enjoy what co-operatives enjoyed, a minimum tax liability. As I say at that point of time the logical way to go was to change the whole capital base of the credit union from being all shares to being very minimum shares and everything else in on deposits.
Did you have a solicitor? Who was your solicitor at that time at the League?
KY: Well Jack Lange of course was right from the start. He was a great friend of Stan Arneil’s.
Yes I know, he still is. Well he is again, shall we put it that way. I believe they fell out for a number of years.
KY: But Jack Lange has always been the League’s solicitor.
I have interviewed him. Do you remember the actual year of that challenge?
KY: Not without referring to the Minutes. But it would have been in the early 1960s, around 1960.
There was another challenge, which was I believe a court challenge, which Father Gallagher took on. What was that about?
KY: Father Gallagher was involved in a few court cases there, but I can’t specifically remember what they were about. I don’t think they ever seriously affected what we were up to at that time.
There was one of them and I do know what that was about, that was the right to have community credit unions. Lake Macquarie was the one.
KY: I must confess I don’t know about it.
You are not aware about the other main case that he also took on in the taxation field?
KY: No.
I have got conflicting reports on that. Some people say he won it and some people say he lost it. I haven’t been able to put my finger on the year so your help would have been appreciated. So who negotiated the MLC insurance deal?
KY: Well the small committee that was looking into that insurance business. That was myself and certainly Kevin Yates and also we had the facilities, or the use, of a fellow called Jim Thompson who at that time was the New South Wales Manager of the Co-operative Insurance Society. Whilst his company in a sense, I suppose, was on the outskirts of the thing but not really in a position to supply this sort of loan protection insurance, nevertheless Jim Thompson was very instrumental in assisting us at that time. He has since died.
Was it him who hired Clarrie Murphy wasn’t it?
KY: I have got a shrewd suspicion yes, that the Co-operative Insurance did assist financially in those early days in some way by employing Clarrie for a few days a week. There was some involvement but I am not sure of the details.
Were you involved with Stan Arneil in the League at all?
KY: No. My first associations with Stan would have come about when the ABC Credit Union was formed. I can remember talking to Stan on the phone at the time the ABC credit unions were formed. Subsequently of course we got the ABC Credit Union to join the League and Stan became involved in the League at that point. He was elected as a Director of the League and it was around 1962 that Stan became the Chairman of the League.
So you had already gone by that time.
KY: At which time I had basically faded out of the League’s activities.
What was Stan Arneil’s style?
KY: Well he was certainly forthright. He was a man that had very clear ideas as to the direction things should take. I think he was very socially minded in so far as he saw the credit unions as being the answer to the world’s economic problems. He didn’t always carry everybody with him. I must confess that I never had any disagreements with Stan. Our relationship has always been very, very pleasant, in the odd times when I have met him in the years since.
Right. But he did clash with some people?
KY: Oh yes he had violent clashes with a great number of people.
Do you know who?
KY: I know Clarrie Murphy. It could well be anybody who had much to do with the credit union movement.
Do you remember what Clarrie Murphy’s clashes were about?
KY: Not really. I should imagine this would have all developed within the Board of the League after I left.
You weren’t there when Dermot Ryan and Ken Miller were there?
KY: No. I have the vaguest memory of Dermot Ryan. Ken Miller I certainly know a bit better because during the formation of the League and in those early days Ken used to manage the Motor Transport Credit Union. One of the other functions we used to have was what was known as the Credit Union Chapter. We used to meet once a month and have educational sessions and used to show film strips and films that we had brought back from the United States. Ken Miller was always active in the Chapter.
Who else was active in that Chapter? Was this the City of Sydney Chapter?
KY: Yes this was the City of Sydney Chapter. Used to meet in the Hibernian Society up there in Elizabeth Street. Well of course all the well-known names were there. Tom and I guess Dermot turned up at times, and Ken Miller and Clarrie Murphy, Tom Kelly. All the original pioneers.
There was another one as well. I believe they went across, he was from Lake Macquarie, what was his name, Macrea, something like that. The three of them went to America together.
KY: No, beyond my time.
So you aren’t aware of any of that?
KY: No. You see Clarrie Murphy and I were the first to go to the United States in 1958. Kevin Yates went in 1959. Then I think it was a fellow called Harold Hoyle, who has since died, he went in 1960. In 1961 it was Dom Arrivolo, who is still about. Then from 1962 onwards, as I say, I have lost track.
Right. So there is a whole area there where you would have heard something but it was not from personal experience?
KY: Because CSR had disassociated itself from the League, we weren’t eligible to go to any of the League Annual Meetings. Really any little tidbits that I heard, which weren’t much, were simply because of personal contact with people like Kevin Yates, who I was very friendly with, used to see a far bit of. Less so Clarrie Murphy.
So is there anything we haven’t covered?
KY: I think basically we have covered the main points.
You weren’t involved in the credit unions after that. Did you go and work somewhere else?
KY: No, I have always worked for CSR until I retired. I finally retired from CSR in 1982 from my position as Manager of the credit union. But as I say in those last five or six years since our credit union was a member of ACCU, the Association of Central Credit Unions.
When was that formed?
KY: ACCU would have been formed about 1975, 1976. They were formed as I suppose in a sense as opposition to the New South Wales Credit Union League.
Was this a philosophical opposition?
KY: The credit unions that belonged to ACCU were basically credit unions that were philosophically in disagreement with the League and the way the League went on.
What about AFCUL?
KY: I know nothing about AFCUL.
This Association of Central Credit Unions was set up in 1975, 1976. That is about the time that Dermot Ryan was removed from AFCUL. The insurance controversy was already well and truly over by then.
KY: All this was beyond me. We never got involved in this at ACCU. I was on the Board of ACCU for most of the time that it existed.
When did it cease to exist?
KY: ACCU went out of existence in 1983, or maybe early 1984. ACCU in a sense was taken over by the New South Wales Credit Union League.
What do you mean taken over?
KY: Well they merged. Merged back into the League. It was considered desirable to liquidate ACCU for a number of a reasons and ACCU merged with the League. That is where I met our friend, Alistair, he was the bookkeeper at ACCU.
There are a lot of people who seem to stick fairly close to credit unions. So what did you do after you had finished up at CSR?
KY: When I finished with CSR in 1982 I basically became the Honorary Federal Treasurer of the Church Missionary Society. I spend the bulk of my retired life now working for that society.
What exactly do they do?
KY: Well we are basically involved with putting missionaries overseas into fifteen countries. We have one hundred sixty missionaries at the moment. We work on a budget of about $4.5 million a year. The Federal Treasurer in a sense, I suppose, is the chief ‘bean counter’ of the whole outfit. Preparing budgets and all that goes with it.
What exactly do they do overseas?
KY: Well basically involved in Church planting, in evangelism. But we do have a considerable number of medical people in places like Nepal. We have people lecturing in universities in Indonesia. We have a whole range of people consistent with the Christian witness and involvement in actual fact essential jobs in these third world countries.
Do any of them plant credit unions at all?
KY: No I have never actively pursued the point of credit unions.
You weren’t involved in the Extension yourself from the League?
KY: No, only in so far as we did have some involvement with Father Ganey. Clarrie Murphy and myself coming back from the United States visited Fiji and New Zealand on behalf of CUNA. We knew Father Ganey well from his visits to Australia.
Right. Was there any Anglican involvement in Fiji?
KY: No.
All Catholic.
KY: All Catholic or Methodist. There was no Anglican involvement.
Well is there anything else we should have covered that we haven’t?
KY: I think we have done well.
Thank you very much Keith Young.
End Tape 1B