ANSWCU 40 : 6 JUNE 1990: INTERVIEWER RICHARD RAXWORTHY: TALKING WITH BERT BEAUFOY WHO WAS A DIRECTOR OF THE ASSOCIATION FOR A NUMBER OF YEARS.
I will ask you, where were you born and when?
BB: I was born in Western Queensland on 17 July 1933.
Did you grow up around there?
BB: No, I stayed there until I was four and then my parents, my father was a wool classer, moved temporarily to Sydney and then Newcastle. I stayed in Newcastle from when I was four until I was thirty. I then moved to Tamworth in 1966 and came back to Newcastle in 1983 and I have been here since.
Right, that has covered the places you have been. Where did you go to school?
BB: I attended primary school at Marks Point, which is a suburb of Newcastle near Lake Macquarie, and Newcastle Boys’ High for my secondary education which is located at Waratah. I partially completed an accountancy course at Maitland and Newcastle Technical Colleges and that is the extent of my education.
What did you like and dislike about school?
BB: I didn’t like school very much at all. Except for one period when I was at Marks Point I wasn’t a particularly good scholar, only average, and I guess I was always on the bad side of most teachers. My schooling time wasn’t really a happy period for me.
What do you remember of your father, what influence did he have on you?
BB: Well, my father was a wool classer and he was away for long periods of my life. When we moved to Newcastle in my early days he was away classing in sheds from Central Queensland to New South Wales and he usually left in February and came home in October. He was away for all that period and when he came back he’d either pick up some local work from October through to the following February. So whilst he was a disciplinarian, he didn’t exert a great influence on my life simply because he wasn’t there.
Well, it must have been your mother because ??????? he wasn’t there?
BB: Oh, she was. There was never much money in our place and we had to be very careful with things. My mother used to go to town once a year, for example, on the bus. From Marks Point into Newcastle, that was all she could afford. You know, we lived on the smell of a oily rag.
What did you do for recreation as kids then?
BB: We played a bit of sport, not organised sport because there was nothing organised in that area, but we used to play cricket and soccer and that sort of thing around the place. Just generally hang around the area.
Did you ever manage to get to the Saturday morning movies?
BB: We did use to go to the afternoon films which was located at Belmont three or four miles away. That was a standard weekly treat for which I received one shilling, sixpence to go in, a penny each way on the bus and four pence to spend, and that was it.
What else was there at school? Did you take part in any sport at school?
BB: No there was no organised sport at the primary school at that time, up until about fourth class and then I was a member of the school cricket team for a little while. I played soccer in the winter. That was the extent of my activities. At high school I was captain of one soccer team which was in an inter-school competition for two years. It was a soccer team. We used to just go swimming in the summer. So that was it.
So when you left school, what was your first job?
BB: I worked as a clerk at the BHP here in Newcastle for eighteen months, then I moved to the local county council which was then part of the Newcastle-Shortland Council organisation. Except for one interlude of nine months, I stayed there for sixteen years at NESCA, which is Newcastle Electric Supply Council Administration. I then moved to Tamworth to take up a position with Peel-Cunningham County Council. I stayed there from 1966 to 1983. I then came back to Newcastle and we went into a newsagency for five and a half years.
You have given me your whole history in one go there. When you were at BHP here as a clerk, were you involved in any union activity then?
BB: No. I don’t think the white collar staff were encouraged to join any union. In fact, the system operated at BHP that you didn’t even become a member of the staff until you had got part of the way through a recognised accountancy course. So in fact there were people who had been there for many years still on temporary staff. I was only there for eighteen months so I never got off the temporary side of things.
Sounds like the government.
BB: Well if you can imagine an organisation that size, everybody was really a numeral and there wasn’t a lot of inter-personal relations either between members of the staff or the staff and their superiors.
What influence did you get from your mother do you think?
BB: I guess she taught me to be thrifty, of necessity. I think she had a very caring attitude to others. She was always involved in doing organised charitable work, in other words she helped the local church she was always on Mothers’ Club, P and C, local Red Cross and all this sort of stuff. In fact she pushed me into collecting for the Red Cross during the War years and I think I was one of the only kids in the area that got an honour badge from the Red Cross for collecting ten pounds over ‘x’ number of years. So I guess to that extent I can say that she sort of imparted on me to some extent a caring influence for others, if I could put it that way without sort of sounding boastful.
Any religious influence at all?
BB: I attended church regularly in my teens, an inter-denominational church at Marks Point, where I lived. Then when we moved to Tamworth I regularly attended a Methodist church there. I was never really into church, I was on the peripheral. I was Secretary of the parish in Tamworth for a couple of years when they needed somebody, and I was there.
Wasn’t really a driving thing for you, credit union wise?
BB: No, never.
When did you first hear about credit unions?
BB: I was simply a floor member here in Newcastle when I was at Shortland Council.
Which credit union?
BB: In Newcastle? The Shortland County Council Employees Credit Union. I was a dollar a week member and didn’t have anything to do with the organisation. We then moved to Tamworth and there is no credit union of the Council, which surprised me a little. At that time the Local Government Electricity, the Association, which is an organisation of Councils, were pushing credit unions to their members. Anyway at one stage the boss said to me, ‘Do you know anything about credit unions?’ I said, ‘Well, I have been a member of one.’ So he said, ‘Well read this and see what you think about it.’ So I read the documentation that came up from the Electricity Association and from thereon we started one at Peel-Cunningham County Council and that is how I became involved in it.
So who was the motivating power behind starting it?
BB: Well, I guess I was.
Do you remember the inaugural meeting, if you organised it?
BB: Oh yes. John Porter from the League, as it was then, we contacted the League simply because we didn’t know who else to contact and John Porter arrived on the scene and spoke with me. We then, he and I between us and a friend of mine who was the accountant with the Council, then democratically selected a number of people who we thought would be useful in giving a fair spread of representation of the various departments within the Council. We got these people together and put it to them so that if they saw fit they would form the nucleus of the first Board, which we duly elected and that started it.
Did they have John Porter speak at the meeting?
BB: Yes, John Porter did come up to the inaugural meeting. That was in 1967, September I think round about then, but it was 1967. John Porter did speak at the meeting because he controlled the meeting, he ran the meeting and there was some apprehension about those that were sort of pre-selected, if you like, to be the first Board because some felt it wasn’t quite the democratic process. Fortunately for us, John steered the meeting in that direction and they were duly elected.
Sort of guided democracy?
BB: That’s the way. Well it has always been that way hasn’t it?
Do you remember who was applying the push in that area towards the credit unions being set up around the shires? Wasn’t the union was it?
BB: No, it wasn’t the union to my recollection. In fact I don’t think we at the County Council didn’t have any discussion with any union.
I didn’t get quite clear who it was said to you, ‘We should have a credit union’?
BB: It was the County Clerk, he said, ‘Do you know anything about them and what do you think?’ and I said, ‘Well, I think they are a good idea.’ So he just left it to me to sort of go from there and run with the ball, so to speak.
So do you think he got it from the Shire Record or something like that, or did he get it from MEU?
BB: The first thing that happened at Peel-Cunningham was that we got a letter from the Local Government Electricity Association (LGEA) promoting credit unions for staff membership. But I sort of had it in my mind and I had had previous discussions with some other staff members but they had an unhappy experience with the punters’ club where the Secretary run off with all the funds, so they weren’t terribly thrilled about the idea of putting in money and entrusting it to their fellow employees. Overcoming those initial reservations, it started from there.
It was probably the League, I suppose, who were operating behind?
BB: Oh yes it was, because I think the League was probably trying to influence the LGEA’s to spread the word amongst different work groups and that is how it sort of started off.
So the inaugural meeting, how many members did you have for your inaugural meeting, roughly?
BB: I would say probably forty or fifty out of a work force of two hundred, which we thought was pretty good at the time. Then that would probably be the lowest attendance at any Annual General Meeting we have ever had, it just went on from there.
So what happened then. Did you sort of allocate areas for people to go and speak to their membership drive, or what?
BB: Oh yes we did the normal things. We did have full support from our employer, the Council, and the Council in that area had a number of depots, five or six depots, away from the main town of Tamworth in little places such as Coonabarabran and Quirindi and so on. We went to speak out at meetings in each of these locations to try and boost membership and inspire confidence. I think the fact that a number of employees decided to invest in the credit union and take loans and withdraw their money, when they found that could be done without any problem and that the cheques were met, it inspired confidence in the workforce and it went from there. I think too the fact that the hierarchy in the organisation, the various managers and so on, supported it fully. It gave confidence and inspiration to the general workforce.
So you had pay-roll deductions from the start, did you?
BB: Yes we did. We had pay-roll deductions from the start and of course it was on an entirely voluntary basis. All the work was done in a voluntary capacity and we did get a lot of co-operation from the employer.
So where did you set up shop, in your office?
BB: Yes. I was the initial Chairman and the Treasurer had a small office on another floor and that was the original set-up of the organisation. Withdrawals were given on a daily basis. There was no such things as restricted hours, or that sort of thing, but within reason given that most of it was done in the employer’s time. But those who were involved in the credit union itself, always gave more than their necessary time to the employer so there was no problem in that area.
Were there any other credit unions in the area at all?
BB: No, no local credit unions. The Electricity Commission Credit Union, which had its head office in Sydney, had a branch in Tamworth and the ABC Credit Union also had members in Tamworth, but we were the first local credit union to start. Then within a year or two there was a couple of others started up as well, which I was involved with. One for the other Councils in the district, which was the Local Government Councils which looked after the Shire and Town Council and there was another one started after that on the Fielder’s group of companies, which I was involved with.
Did you have a Chapter?
BB: There was a Chapter established.
Who was responsible for that?
BB: I think I was actually. It was called the Namoi Chapter and it took in the area from Tamworth, Gunnedah and Narrabri and the surrounding districts from there. The Chapter was quite successful for three or four years, but eventually it sort of just died off. It was used mostly as a social outlet for credit union members and we tried to make it a social occasion at each meeting and also the time to explain and push credit union views and that sort of thing. At each Chapter meeting, this was before I joined the League Board, at a number of the meetings we tried to get somebody from the League Board to come up and speak which sort of added a bit of confidence to the members that were there and it sort of looked as if the Chapter itself wasn’t working in isolation.
The various credit unions that were in the area at that time, were any of them thought to be too small?
BB: Well there wasn’t the emphasis on size at that time as there appeared to be later on. I know when we got to one hundred members we thought that was a marvellous achievement. At about that time I think the Board was saying things like credit unions under three hundred members aren’t viable. We thought that was a load of rubbish because we thought we were very viable and going along quite well with just one hundred members.
How much do you think, and I suppose I am asking you to blow your own trumpet to some extent, did your financial knowledge help to make a small credit union viable?
BB: I don’t know that I own a great deal of financial knowledge. We had a number of conservative people on that credit union and a couple of us that were radicals to some extent. So I think it was a blend of two opposing views. I think one of the good things about our credit union was that we initially had a great deal of support from our employer. They allowed us pay-roll deductions, but the accounting was done on their accounting machines, for which we paid a small fee but it didn’t anywhere near cover the cost. Because of the influence of the managers’ in the organisation to help the credit union we were getting large pay-roll deductions per capita, compared to a lot of other credit unions, and we didn’t have the expenses of running an administrative staff in the early days. So all of the funds that came in enabled us to pay good interest rates on savings and have very cheap loans. But we were probably the last, if not the last one of the last, credit unions in New South Wales to get away with the 1 per cent per month thing which was the benchmark for everybody at that time. In fact in the first three or four years we gave a rebate of loan interest to the members after each year.
That 1 per cent a month, that turned out to be 10 point something didn’t it actually?
BB: Well, it was 12 per cent reducible and we thought that was a good benchmark. It was easy to remember. Nobody objected to the cost of loans and it was just a marketing tool that we thought we could use.
12 per cent yes. So yours didn’t come down like many others did until there started to be a fair bit of competition around?
BB: This was the charge out rate on loans. We didn’t put ours up until years after everybody else felt there was a need to go to 15 or 16 per cent.
But they came down first, didn’t they?
BB: Well only by way of the loan interest rebate. You are with me. At the end of each year. The charge of 1 per cent a month, or 12 per cent and then if we had a surplus that we felt was more than was needed, more than required, well we just rebated that service to the members at the end of each year.
You were still accounting by machines at that stage of the proceedings? No computerisation?
BB: Yes. In fact we don’t know when we got computers at that particular credit union. Probably in about 1980 when the Council itself upgraded to computer and we hired somebody to write programs for us and then we bought time on the Council’s computer.
When did there begin to be any talk about community credit unions?
BB: Probably in the late 1970s, I can’t put a date on it exactly. But the community credit union in Tamworth which is now the Tamworth Credit Union, was originally the one that sprang out of the Fielder’s group of companies which was known as FIDEP. Unfortunately they spent more than they earned and got into a bit of bother for a while. I went on the Board for twelve months to try and help stabilise things. It probably give the Board a bit of confidence to think that somebody from the League was there. Then Geoff Cambridge came up and cut a swathe through the Board’s policies and put interest loan rates up to 18 per cent, which was unheard of at that time, but it was the only financially viable alternative. Then the Manager left and they had a number of problems of a period. They finally got back on their feet and then they decided that they were limited to where they could go, given the expense of running the organisation, so they decided to go community. At the same time, though, the League was pushing community credit unions through their field staff.
Who?
BB: Well, Brian, forgotten his name again he came from Lismore, Brian was one of their field officers. But I think it was general League policy at that time that they saw the future in community credit unions rather than certain employment-based types.
Did Peel-Cunningham ever become amalgamated or not?
BB: Yes it did. It finally amalgamated with the Local Government Credit Union, to become the Peel Valley Credit Union. This was just about twelve months before I left Tamworth. We had a membership of about four hundred I suppose, which included founding members. But we were running out of membership and had excess funds while the Local Government Credit Union had members but no funds, so we felt it was time we got into bed with them to satisfy both of our needs, in a way. I sort of instigated that because I felt that it was the future of the credit union. We had resisted going into that credit union for sometime, because whilst they were successful we didn’t feel they were as successful as we were. We might have been big-headed but we thought we had the best credit union in Tamworth financially and that we had our margins cut to the bone and that we were offering the best service. We felt we were more progressive than the Local Government Credit Union. Whether that was a fact or not, I am not sure, but we just felt they were too conservative. Anyway it was seen as the way to go and that is what took place. That merger took place just after I left Tamworth in 1983. It had been on the drawing board for twelve or eighteen months.
Was there ever a Manager there? Did you become Manager?
BB: No, I was always an employee of the Council. We had an Office Manager for some time and I think since my departure and the amalgamation she has been appointed Secretary/Manager actually. That is the way it sort of evolved.
How did you become one of the Directors of the League?
BB: Well that was back in 1970. I had sort of taken a view that I would like to see some representation from that part of the State. The League at about that time changed its rules so that there were three country members were given specific areas of representation on the League Board. Now we had only been in the League a couple of years, but we felt that there was no chance of anybody getting representation by way of popular vote simply because nobody up that way was known. Anyway there was a representative on the Board from the Central Coast who represented a very large area right up to the Queensland border. So it was felt in our area that we couldn’t get adequate representation from somebody geographically located just a few miles from Sydney. So it was decided to run a candidate and it was me.
Who decided it was you?
BB: I think our Board felt they would like to get representation in the broader field and I was the logical choice because I was Chairman and sort of a front runner in the credit union at that time. So I stood for election, I am not sure if it was 1972 or 1973, and I was elected. That commenced my association with the Board.
It’s got 1972 down there. Mine is from the Annual Report so it could be one year out either way.
BB: That would be right. It might have been ’72. Yes it was 1972, I beg your pardon.
You see I only picked it up in the 1972 Annual Report, but it could have been 1971 you see.
BB: No, I am sure it was 1972.
The Annual Report sort of go across the years. You can never be absolutely sure unless you are looking at the Elections Book, which nobody has allowed me to look at yet, I don’t know why.
BB: I can’t imagine that having any personal information.
I didn’t actually ask to look at the Elections Book, I asked to look at the Minutes and in the first instance I was knocked back. I am sure they would let me look now, anyway, but at the time I was doing somebody else’s history and not the Association’s you see, when I asked. But I haven’t looked up the Elections Book as yet. So you go on. By what sort of margin, have you any idea?
BB: No, I don’t. I understand it was fairly comfortable only because of the previous year or two there had been a number of credit unions which had sprung up in country areas, particularly in the north-west. There was a couple in Armidale at that stage and there were further ones at Lismore and Coffs Harbour and all up in the general northern district. I just felt that they wanted a representative located closer to where they were. I don’t know that I could represent them any better but I think they probably felt that that was a possibility. So I don’t really know what the initial margin was on that first ballot.
Do you remember what issues came up first, at the League?
BB: Well the insurance wrangle was a matter that was going full steam ahead at that stage when the League Board was endeavouring to persuade their members to break away from CUNA Mutual and CUMIS. That caused a lot of anguish all round. I think that was the major bone of contention at that time. Then of course it wasn’t long that the financial crisis all round was a major contention for everybody from there onward. Credit unions were falling over and the League itself wasn’t travelling that well, financially. So it was a torrid time all round.
End Tape 1b: 4256 Words: 1 hour 35 minutes.
ANSWCU 41: 6 JUNE 1990: INTERVIEWER RICHARD RAXWORTHY: TALKING WITH BERT BEAUFOY
We got to the point where you were on the League Board and the first main issue was the insurance. What do you think was the main issue from your point of view and what was personalities?
BB: Well I don’t think personalities came into it to influence the League Board. I felt it was a genuine decision. Simply the financial arrangements offered by the American affiliated association wasn’t good enough in the circumstances. The League Board felt that a better financial bottle was available locally and it was purely a straight down the line decision. There was a lot of fervour conjured up by various Board members and I think the League Board members introduced personalities as against the Board Executive which was trying to put forward a purely routine matter. To that extent I felt the initial issue was done clearly as a business decision, but it soon became coloured simply because of the introduction of personalities, given the heavy weights in the organisation who were in fact then representing CUNA Mutual and CUMIS. Stan Arneil and company. And the association of the Americans and the friendships that had been built up by some of the other Americans that were involved in it.
Did you feel that Stan Arneil was caught, or that he was no longer representing the movement as such, or was it just a plain commercial thing?
BB: From Stan’s point of view? I felt he was probably initially the ham in the sandwich, that he could see that his future employment path was going to be cut off at the pockets. Whilst he recognised that it was a commercial decision on behalf of the League Board I felt that he then had to become emotive to try and ensure his own future via the League.
What about the other issue, the matter of control from America and here?
BB: I think that was an issue too for the locals, that we felt that the matter was out of our hands and that the policies and the prices and everything were being set in the States. There seemed to be no element of control and we couldn’t have any input into the control of our own funds. So it was a matter of some concern. But this debate had been raging for a while before I came on the League Board scene. If you weren’t at League Board level you really didn’t know too much of the background. I don’t think that the general credit union members, until it was finally laid before them at an Annual Meeting, were terribly aware of a lot of the to-ing and fro-ing that was going behind the scenes between the different individuals.
Had you been overseas at all at that stage?
BB: No, I have never been overseas.
So you don’t know anything first hand from what happened in America?
BB: No, not at all.
Have you read about that?
BB: To some extent, but of course then you get a coloured perspective from each of the different participants. For instance I think one of the League Board members that came over, came back and presented a paper which he hadn’t actually written, but it was purported to be put forward by him on other matters. I think that his influence was probably coloured by the associations that he made overseas.
What paper was that?
BB: It was a paper put out by Owen Jones, I don’t know if I can just remember his name now. It was a paper that was put forward which rather impressed me, but I found that he didn’t even write it, yet it had his name on the cover. I can’t remember what the subject was now, sorry.
Well, I know what year Owen went, he went in 1968.
BB: Well this was subsequent to his return and he put out a paper which was disseminated amongst the credit unions and I was very impressed with it. It had Owen’ name on the cover, but then in fact he didn’t write it.
You know that for a fact do you, did he tell you that?
BB: Well he told me that he didn’t write it.
Who did?
BB: I don’t know, I think it was a staffer. I had the impression that it was an American, but I might be wrong there.
It wouldn’t have been Dermot Ryan?
BB: I don’t know who it was. I know that Owen and Dermot were pretty pally, but I don’t know whether it went that far.
Did you know Dermot?
BB: Yes, is he still around?
No he died just last year.
BB: We are all getting long in the tooth.
That is most probably what led me to be interviewing you, because the people are getting away from me. People were saying we should record people.
BB: I guess Dermot was always a candidate for a heart attack, he always seemed ready to jump out of his skin.
Well of course later on he sort of settled down, but he is gone now. Query on that same issue still, I know you hadn’t got the other side of it, but did you insure with CUNA Mutual, CUMIS at Peel Cunningham?
BB: We did right up until the time the League recommended the change. I think for a little while after we may have insured with CUNA Mutual, CUMIS, but then we could see that it wasn’t viable and I think by that time I had got on the League Board and I could see the other side of the coin and I felt we were looking after ourselves by insuring locally.
The other question is, did you insure through the League or independently?
BB: No we always insured through the League. We did all of our business through the Association.
So when you stayed with CUNA Mutual, CUMIS, after the Association had given it away, how did you do that?
BB: I’m not quite sure now. I just can’t remember the exact timing, but I had in my mind that we continued to insure with CUNA Mutual, CUMIS, for a while.
Did you, or did any of your Board, or your staff, ever take part in one of these Policy Holders’ Committees, Advisory Committees?
BB: No. never.
I am trying to find somebody who has.
BB: I think they were held in the metropolitan area, weren’t they? I don’t know that they were ever held up where we were. I can’t recall it. In fact I don’t even know what business they discussed, I’ve got no idea. I would have thought John Gormley, have you spoken to him, he might have gone to one. Because they were very much CUNA Mutual for a while there.
Yes I did actually. Yes he did. I queried with him and I am querying with you, you see, as to whether this policy that the CUNA Mutual had from America of having these Policy Holders’ Committees was circumventing the League, is that it?
BB: Well, I don’t know whether it did or not. I was never involved in any of the meetings, as I say. I don’t really know.
I haven’t got enough information. That is what happened in America and that is why they used to regard them as a law unto themselves.
BB: Well I think it was always felt that CUNA Mutual, CUMIS, was the tail that was wagging the dog over there because they had become so financially powerful. They became a law unto themselves and they weren’t subject to anybody else’s’ direction. I think this was confirming a view that existed here at the time and we felt if we kept going along with this the whole thing would get away from us and we would have no control over our own destiny.
You were saying that the next issue that you had anything to do with was the one of credit unions who had trouble. What do you remember about that?
BB: Well credit unions were getting into hot water through, probably, poor loan policies and inept management. That was about the time, I have the feeling, the Association set up its own fund to protect Association members, long before the Savings Reserve Board came on the scene.
You don’t remember that?
BB: I am sure that happened. I am trying to cast my mind back because I can remember that there were some calls on that fund and one that came up at a meeting relating to the Kurri Community Credit Union. That credit union was virtually going to the wall and it made a call on the fund but they had previously resigned from the League. The League Board, at that stage, told them that it would not help Kurri Community Credit Union. I at that time agreed with that decision but I had reservations after the meeting, in fact I wished I’d voted against that particular motion. Not that my vote would have made any difference but at least it wouldn’t have been unanimous.
What about the failure of the Shop Distributors and Allied Credit Union?
BB: Well, I can recall it happening now that you mention it, but it didn’t impact on me greatly. I don’t know why it didn’t, but it didn’t. I guess because I felt at that time I was more concerned with local issues that affected the credit unions that I was more or less representing, for instance Kurri. I felt more keenly about the Kurri Credit Union, even though it was much smaller, but it was in the northern area. Even though they’d resigned from the League Board, I felt that it wouldn’t have been out of place for us to have at least offered a helping hand to some extent. The Shop Assistants Credit Union, I can remember it going down but it didn’t impact on me greatly, not personally.
I wonder if there was as much communication as there might have been, in that case, because it happened in a hurry, I understand. In actual fact the call went out to help them, but by the time that it did come back it was academic.
BB: As I say I don’t remember too much, I just can’t recall all of the detail of that particular one. However, there were other matters too. The Communications Credit Union and the notorious thirteen months interest was another matter that raised its head at that stage. Credit unions, as you know, were generally feeling the pinch.
Now what was this Communications one?
BB: I thought everybody had heard of that one. Well Communications Credit Union was a credit union that was set up by Ron, what was his name? Anyway he was the Acting Manager of the League at that stage.
It wasn’t Les Robinson?
BB: No. It wasn’t Les Robinson. It was the Acting General Manager, at one stage when Les was off sick. Anyway I will think of his name in a minute. But Ron drew together a number of credit unions in the Telecom and Postal Communications area and formed Communications Credit Union. The Manager, I believe, was an employee of Telecom and he was seconded to run the credit union for twelve months or so. Anyway, like a number of credit unions at the time, they had over-extended themselves and they were seeking League assistance, financial assistance, which was being granted to them. It got to the stage when they had to produce their books. So the books wouldn’t look as bad as they were in fact it was proposed that thirteen months loan interest income would be shown as income to bolster the income of the credit union and not highlight the losses incurred. That got short shrift of course, but it was raised and I thought everybody knew about that one.
The auditor would have had difficulty with a thing like that, wouldn’t he?
BB: I suppose he would, but I don’t remember who the auditors were at the time. I remember the Manager approached Les Robinson over this matter. I may have it wrong, they may not have been going to publish an Annual Report, they might have presented those figures to Les to show him that the credit union was doing better than it in fact was. I may not have been part of the Annual Report but just an indication to Les, so he might have been sort of induced to go along with giving them extra funds. In fact we didn’t and they pulled the plug on them and they had to curtail their activities, rather dramatically. The Manager resigned or was replaced or whatever, I think. After that it was a turning point in that credit union.
Do you remember the argument about deficit budgeting?
BB: Yes. To some degree, given the Chinese accounting method and so on.
I understand that once the Registrar was encouraging people to indulge in deficit budgeting in order to get the credit unions enlarged quicker.
BB: Well, I didn’t think it was quite that way. I thought the League was inclined to induce credit unions to deficit budgeting provided they could see that it was going increase their potential rather dramatically. The Registrar took rather a dim view of this. Actually when you first spoke I thought you meant about the provision of reserves, which was another matter.
Well Ken Byrne mentioned this. He said he was against deficit budgeting and some people were for it.
BB: Well I think this was a matter which arrived before Ken was on the Board. I would think long before Ken arrived on the League Board, whilst he was the Manager of a community credit union in Sydney, at that time.
Earlwood, I think.
BB: Yes, I think it was. But I personally didn’t see anything wrong with deficit budgeting provided people just didn’t spend willy-nilly, that they had a purpose in mind. I think the League promoted it quite openly. I didn’t know the Registrar was as well.
I might have it wrong.
BB: I am not sure about that.
The other thing, do you remember the Common Board that they had there for a while? They pushed a whole lot of other credit unions into this Common Board, the ones that were not doing so well?
BB: That’s right. They were oversighting a number of credit unions in Sydney that were having a great deal of difficulty. There were a number of credit unions involved. I am just trying to think who they were. I can’t even remember who was on the Common Board, but there were at least one or two League Board members, weren’t there?
It ended up as the Metropolitan, or most of them got put into Metropolitan in the end.
BB: Again, while it interested me, it escapes my memory now. I can’t remember the credit unions that were involved in it. There were a number of community credit unions in central Sydney and Burwood, around that area. I think they set up their office in the League building, downstairs.
Well, if you don’t know anything about it there is no point in pursuing it. George Prescott may know.
BB: No, I don’t know anything about it at all. George was a member, wasn’t he.
Yes. The main one was John McIntyre and I think Helen McIntyre was a Director as well.
BB: I think she was. I know John was on it and I can remember George Prescott being on it.
So what other issues were involved while you were on the Board? Or have we not covered that particular area of the problem credit unions yet, I don’t think, properly? I mean you said there were a number up this way that were in difficulties and you were involved with that.
BB: Well, the Fielder’s credit union in Tamworth was in difficulty. I think it was suffering from the same malaise as those that ended up in that hotch potch in Sydney. They had over-spent and they weren’t getting anywhere and I think each month they were just showing a greater deficit on their books. They had to have some surgery and I was on that Board for twelve months, say, just to try and give them some confidence and hope that they could pull through the hard times and finally they did.
What else is there of that period, during the time you were on the Board, that was of concern, do you remember?
BB: I can’t think of anything at the moment.
When you were on the Board there, George McCready had already gone off the Board?
BB: George was off the Board at that stage and then he came back after for another limited period. George was from the County Council of Dubbo I think. Macquarie.
He is still there. I have been up to interview him.
BB: Right. Well George would have some strong views.
Why do you say that?
BB: Well, he was always a very forthright sort of a character. He always had his own views. I think George used the rules to get representation back on the League Board. I am not quite sure why he would bother. If the membership showed it was disenchanted for some reason or another, why bother to go again. But that is what George did and so be it.
Now what about the cutting down of the numbers?
BB: From fifteen to nine, do you mean? Well I think it was a good move. Les Robinson would have liked to have seen it cut further, preferably down to three in Les’ view. But I personally felt that it was a good move. The Board was getting very unwieldily. It got up to fifteen or sixteen there for a while and the meetings were going until midnight or later and commencing at 6.30 or 7.00 p.m. They were just becoming too torturous. We had one or two people, probably myself included sometimes, that tended to repeat what the previous speaker had just said purely for the sake of being heard at the meeting. They were just going on and on and on and nothing was being achieved. There would be a lot of business dealt with very closely up until 10.00 or 11.00 o’clock then the last points on the agenda would be rushed through in half an hour because everybody was sick and tired. They had had enough after doing a day’s work and going there after work.
When you came down from Tamworth, what did you do, how did you get back?
BB: Well I used to generally fly down. There was an afternoon plane that left at about 2.00 or 3.00 o’clock. I would fly to Mascot and get a bus and a train out to Burwood, have a meal and go to the meeting and go back to the motel at about whatever time it was, midnight or after. Get up at 5.00 o’clock and get the plane and go back to work for the day. The next day was always rather long and arduous. But never mind that was the only way it could go.
You managed to keep it up for a number of years?
BB: Yes, I did. Sometimes I would wonder why I was doing it. But mostly it was quite enjoyable. One time was rather difficult when they called a last minute airline strike and I had to drive home after the meeting, which was a bit much.
Was it that bad. With something like that you wouldn’t stay off the following day at all?
BB: No, I felt that the Council was allowing me time off to go to League Board meetings and it was very good of them to do that. I didn’t feel that I had to be taking extra time off, sick or otherwise, by being away from the job when they had been more than considerate to me personally and the credit union generally. So I felt I had an obligation to be at work the next day.
You seem to be in common with most of them.
BB: Well, I think most people involved with credit unions thought they were such a great thing and a good idea that they didn’t mind some personal inconvenience just to be party to it.
Tell me, when the insurance split occurred and the south and the north were already sort of split off at that time, were you party to any of the talks that went on about that time?
BB: No I wasn’t Richard, it was all prior to my time. The Northern Association and the Southern Association as you say were already up and running, so they weren’t an issue. The bringing back of those groups into the fold, for want of a better term, became an issue long ago. But they had already gone. They had set up their separate entities some time past before I got on the League Board.
Were you aware of the fact that the group which later became the Central Association tried to join the Southern Association at one stage?
BB: No, I didn’t know that. But I can remember some of the credit unions involved, I think the Herald Sun was one credit union and one or two others, but I didn’t know they had tried to join the Southern. I don’t remember them trying to join the Southern Association. I wouldn’t have thought that was terribly significant anyway, would you?
Well no, it is just that somebody had said something. Well I was told that they had, particularly the ABC, had tried to join the Southern one before the Central one was formed.
BB: Now that you mention it I think I can recall somebody bringing that up. Whether it was just a discussion at a meeting or somebody said it in passing, I can’t recall. That just shows you that they all need a friend and that they really need a group of credit unions to have some impact on anybody. If they couldn’t reconcile their differences with the League well they felt they had to be in with someone.
I was told that the Southern Association knocked them back. Was there any truth in that?
BB: I don’t know why they would have knocked them back. It must have been true otherwise there would have been no need for a Central Association, would there?
Well it seems that way to me.
BB: No, I can’t give you any more help there.
What about when the issue was re-amalgamating? You were involved there to some extent.
BB: Yes, well I was one of those that sort of vacated a seat to make way for the re-formed Board, so those from the north and the south and whatever could be accommodated so they could get back into the fold so to speak. So that the credit union movement could at last speak with one voice, instead of having these fragments all around the countryside, often times going off in different directions and with a lot of personality problems that were involved.
Sorry, was it put to you that you retire at that stage or did you suggest it?
BB: Well, I don’t think I suggested it. I think it probably came from a recommendation from the Executive Committee of the League who were sort of looking at pulling all these various types together. They said, ‘Well we need to accommodate the members of the Board.’ We had been through the exercise of having a larger Board previously and this had become unworkable, as discussed. So it was obvious to accommodation representation from the northern and southern members that some of the existing League Board members would have to vacate. The vote was taken amongst the various Directors and that is what happened.
Did you resent stepping down at that time?
BB: No. There were three country members who had to make way, two or three I think. I can’t remember all the people who lost their seats but there was Jock Dunn and myself and there must have been another one. There were three country members, one of which was to remain on the Board and it was either Jock, or Ken Byrne or me that would remain and the other two would drop off. Then when the vote came up it was Ken that stayed and it was me that dropped off. But I didn’t resent it. I wouldn’t have minded staying but I wasn’t going to cry because we I didn’t get up. I mean I had done ten years. As I said sometimes you do get reservations about whether you are serving any purpose, because sometimes one feels that you are ineffectual at that level. Really and truly Ken had more to contribute because credit unions were his life. He was a Manager, he was in a larger credit union, he was facing the difficulties and the problems of credit unions far more than I was. I don’t know how long he stayed on the Board after that, but I would have thought he would have been a very good contributing Board member.
What about some of the other members, for instance how did you get on with Ken Miller?
BB: I liked Ken. Ken was a very good Chairman of the Board. I think he is a man of outstanding principle but by the same token he was a political animal. He knew how to control meetings and get meetings to adopt his point of view. That doesn’t mean to say that he wasn’t honest and forthright, but it means that he knew how to sway a meeting. I have seen him go into meetings where at the beginning of the meeting he would be the only one with a particular view and by the way that he dealt with that particular matter you could walk away from that meeting having unanimous support. That wasn’t a Board meeting that was a General meeting as well. I felt that he was an outstanding leader of the credit union movement. One fellow that I greatly admire, though, probably more than Ken, would be Kevin Bain. I felt Kevin gave unstintingly of his time and himself. I think to some extent his family probably suffered to because of the amount of dedication and effort he put into the credit union movement.
What about later on? You were on the Board with Bill Howe too.
BB: Bill was different to both of those. Again, Bill was pretty dedicated. I think Bill could have been more decisive in some areas, but I think he probably had greater respect for a democratic process. Look I think all of the members that served as Chairmen of the Board while I was there did an outstanding job. They were all different but I think they all gave of their own time and abilities tremendously. I have got nothing but the highest respect for each of them. Not all of the other members around the table, but that is a different matter.
How did you get on with John Gormley?
BB: John is all right. I had the feeling that all of the representations from the Sydney County Council, there was only John and Col David from memory, they had to jump to the tune of their own Board rather than divorce themselves from their own Board and put them in the background.
End of Tape 2a: 4614 Words: 1 hour 45 minutes.
ANSWCU 41: 6 JUNE 1990: INTERVIEWER RICHARD RAXWORTHY: TALKING WITH BERT BEAUFOY
Now was there was an area which we have discussed to some extent before, but you mentioned it and then you went off it again, the Savings Protection Fund that they had before the Reserve. Were you involved with that at all?
BB: I wasn’t involved with running the fund.
What about the decisions?
BB: Well only to the extent that the Executive or the General Manager of it would put up a recommendation concerning dispensing some part of the funds to a credit union that was in bother and giving a background to that particular credit union’s activities. That is the only extent of my involvement with that particular fund. As I have said before I was upset about the Kurri one because I think the fund should have been utilised in that particular instance. I mean in the final analysis years later it probably doesn’t matter very much, but I think we could have done something for them particularly when we were going out of our way to help credit unions financially in the way of stability.
The other thing of course which impinges to some extent is the legal push towards the Reserve.
BB: Well, we always felt it was a necessary evil and could be used as a good marketing tool for credit unions to promote their stability and the fact that they did have some further stability in the background rather than just their own financial organisation. So I think generally it was an idea that was viewed pretty positively by everybody. I think the only bone of contention might have been some of the representatives on the Savings Reserve Board at odd times. But other than that I think generally it was pretty well thought of, it was a move in the right direction.
What do you mean, there was too many people from outside the League?
BB: I just felt, at times, and I can’t even remember personalities involved now, it is a while ago.
Let us see what you can remember. What about Father Gallagher, do you remember him?
BB: I can remember hearing of him but I’ve never seen him. Wasn’t he with the Hibernian Society of something.
No, he was the Antigonish. Lidcombe to be precise. You were talking about the Stabilisation Fund and then we were talking about legal, looking towards the establishment of the Reserve Fund and you mentioned a number of people on it.
BB: Well, I don’t recall actually the personalities involved, as I mentioned, but I do recall that there was some disquiet among some of the representatives on the Fund, and I think it was felt generally, I might be wrong here, that the League Board could have done with additional representation, possibly at the expense of some outside representation, simply because we felt that we represented the great majority of credit unions, by far the large majority of credit unions. Also we were the light and we knew where we were going.
You were the end of the tunnel really.
BB: That’s right. Exactly.
The light on the hill. Well were you involved in any lobbying at all, political lobbying?
BB: No. Never. I played a fairly low key role in most of these sort of decisions. That is what I said to you, sometimes I felt I was simply there to make up the number which might sound a bid self-effacing. Most of the work and the action behind the scenes were carried out by the leading lights on the Board who were located in Sydney. I refer to Ken Miller, Kevin Bain, Helen McIntyre, those sorts of people. They were involved in it on a day-to-day basis, whereas some of the other members such as, say for example, Jock Dunn or even Pat Eagen and myself, used to come down to the Board meetings. We would get our own discussion papers and so on, but apart from that we weren’t involved in the day-to-day running of the credit union machine as such, except our own credit unions. So there was no political activity on my part at all. Maybe on the local, have the ?????? Shore Councillors here or something like that just to let them know that the credit unions were up and running and that they were providing a community service and so on. Apart from that not on a State level.
You didn’t have any delegations to Ministers at all?
BB: No, never.
Were you involved with a political party at all?
BB: No, I have never been a member or involved in politics.
What about the power struggles in the Board itself, were you involved in any of those or did you hear about any of those?
BB: Well I suppose there was the Board Executive and in the earlier years there would probably be two or three people which I would probably call malcontents. At various times, when the election of the Executive was coming up, there would be possibly some background discussion on people who should run or who should not become members of the Executive. For example, I would think that mostly the Executive would count on Colin Day opposing their recommendations to come out at the Executive, just as a matter of course. But apart from those sorts of things, I wasn’t involved in too much background discussion. Sometimes it would come up, for example, before Helen became an member of the Executive and when she stood for re-election, it was felt her views were too dogmatic and she was too much of a feminist at times for her to be in that position. Some people felt that she wanted to be Chairman of the Board. Well I don’t know if she ever had ambitions to be Chairman, but I didn’t see anything wrong with her being just a member of the Executive certainly. I don’t know that I would have gone along with voting for her as a Chairman. I was quite happy with the fellow that were there, as I’ve mentioned before.
Was there a sort of line drawn, or did generally people agree?
BB: Generally people agreed, but there would be three or four people that would raise sticking points. There would be Berry Calverley who generally opposed the Executive recommendations, Colin Day and possibly one or two others, who might have been said to form an alliance. But I wasn’t aware of it and I would be very surprised if they were having background discussions before the Board meeting to take a position on any particular issue.
You don’t think there was any caucusing?
BB: I think the only caucusing that might have been done would have been done by the Executive, who met as a matter of course, and they put forward a united front on most issues. I don’t every recall there being too much division between members of the Executive. I might be too naive for all this, but I don’t think there was too much caucusing going on.
Now what about the Mangers of the period of time? When you first arrived there was Les Robinson, wasn’t there?
BB: Les Robinson was the Manager. Then Ron Swanson was the fellow I was trying to think of before, Ron was Acting Manager at times when Les was either away or off sick. Then Reg Elliot came on the scene after that. I wasn’t involved when Clarrie Murphy was Manager and those sort of fellows.
Were you involved when John Harper was Manager?
BB: No, John came on the scene after I left. That was after Reg left, wasn’t it. No I’ve never known John Harper.
Did you agree with the appointment of Reg Elliot from the banking system?
BB: Yes, I did. As I said before, I had a great reliance in Kevin Bain’s judgement. Kevin was the fellow that sort of did all the preliminary interviews, in conjunction with may be one or two others, but he was the fellow that nurtured Reg into the organisation, I felt. I can’t remember all the details, but I think Kevin did interview a number of applicants, or potential Managers, and I felt Reg was the right man at the right time. I think then we did need to have somebody with a banking background at that particular time and I think he made a tremendous input.
What about the time, during that period, when the electronic banking was coming into its own. You know the terminals and such like?
BB: Well, I think that was when we did need his services, or we needed his expertise. We also needed Terry McMannus, who of course was more directly involved in all that. At that time they seemed to me to be the right people for the job. We might have been able to have done better, I don’t know, but I think they were quite adequate for the task at the time.
Were you involved in any of that at all?
BB: Again, no. I was on any sub-committees that may have been oversighting any of the details, I was just getting progress reports as other Board members were from the Manager at the time. I think it has come to pass that there is shared networking facilities and that was an idea that was put forward by the credit union movement at that time and the banks didn’t think it was a possibility. I think that in the long term they were pretty right.
Were you on the Board when the Queensland Teachers’, in 1977, they put the proposal forward that it happened then?
BB: Can’t remember too much about the Queensland Teachers’. I know they were a big force in Queensland and they were making noises about doing things. They opened their own network up there or put in a couple of ATMs in Queensland.
Yes, they did it on their own, but what they were trying to do was start it off all over the country? Then in 1977, which was prior to the release.
BB: Maybe we weren’t ready for it. No, I think maybe our visions weren’t far enough in the future. As it has turned out they were probably dead right.
They probably were. 1980 was when they started and it was fully in by 1983, which was about spot on, I suppose. If it had been any earlier they would have probably had to change the whole thing.
BB: I think Queensland Teachers’ have got a lot to commend them. I personally I wasn’t over impressed with their Manager, was it Lloyd Hawkins, I think it was. He was not a bloke that I could relate to, but obviously he was the right man for them. I didn’t mind Cyril Marsh, I thought Cyril was all right, a nice bloke.
You were involved with Queensland as Queensland, or were you involved at AFCUL level?
BB: Oh no, I wasn’t involved with Queensland as Queensland. I went up to Toowoomba for a School that CUNA Mutual ran, similar to the Newport School. It was just as convenient and cheaper for us to go to Toowoomba, so we went up there. But I didn’t know them apart from meeting their delegates at AFCUL and at one of the seminars conducted in conjunction with the AFCUL meeting. That was all.
That School at Toowoomba, wasn’t the one where Dermot Ryan made a report as Chief Executive Officer of AFCUL, was it?
BB: No, Dermot didn’t attend the meeting. I only went to one School at Toowoomba. Berry Calverley carried the flag and he was sort of running the School. Dermot wasn’t in attendance, no.
I just heard of an occasion when he was there.
BB: No, it might have been before my time.
It was after
BB: Yes, well the Queensland delegates were very upset at the time that they missed out on a seat on the AFCUL Board because of some redistribution. But that happened at the meeting before I got on the League Board, that they weren’t represented at AFCUL level.
Were you a delegate to AFCUL, at all?
BB: Yes, I was an alternate delegate and a delegate once or twice.
Have you got any idea what years?
BB: No, I haven’t.
Would it be the ’80s or ’70s?
BB: It might have been 1980 or 1981, possibly, something like that, or 1979 or 1980, round about then, I think. But that really, on my part anyway, meant going along and putting your hand up. At that time the AFCUL meetings weren’t structured into various discussion groups like they had been previously. The meeting had become much more routine. The AFCUL meeting itself was very formal and most of the decisions had been made. It was just a matter of formalising previous discussions.
Did you go to any AFCUL meetings during the time Dermot Ryan was Chief Executive?
BB: I must have. I must have been there when he was Chief Executive.
1970 to 1974.
BB: Well, I went to all of the AFCUL meetings from 1972. So he must have been Chief Executive. But before I got on the League Board I didn’t know him very well, he was just a figure there at the top of the room there.
Were you involved at all at the time of his retirement?
BB: No. From AFCUL? I was there and Kevin Murray became the Chief Executive. But I don’t remember the circumstances why he even went, to be honest. I remember ???????? Why did he go?
Oh, I can’t be telling you things like that, you are supposed to be telling me.
BB: I don’t know whether he got out of it for health reasons or he felt he couldn’t hack it any more, or what the problem was now. But I remember that Kevin became Chief Executive.
Health reasons went into the report but there was more to it than that. He had lost the support of the Board.
BB: Oh, well yes, I might have heard a rumour to that effect, but it didn’t carry much weight with me at the time.
Well were you aware of what he was doing in the League lender thing, lobbying for taxation exemptions and such like?
BB: I don’t have any personal knowledge. So there is no point in wasting time on it.
Well tomorrow I am interviewing Vince Martin and he was at the political end of things.
BB: Yes, big Vince would know a great deal about it. I am pleased he is there to be able to tell you actually.
Yes, he had to go in for an operation, but it turns out that everything is all right.
BB: He would be an old man know too, wouldn’t he.
I don’t think he is that old.
BB: Well, he left the Board before I got on to it and then wasn’t he transferred to Canberra with the Tax Department? The Taxation Office Credit Union got out of the League and sort of lost touch with him at that stage.
He was the Member for Banks. He was a Member of Parliament. He and Dermot Ryan were the ones that were constantly negotiating, mainly Dermot Ryan doing the negotiating, but it was Vince Martin behind him who was breaking the ground so to speak.
BB: Oh well, that should be an interesting discussion tomorrow for you.
Oh yes, there are lots of stories about Dermot. I am surprised you didn’t hear about some of them.
BB: Well as I keep mentioning to you, I was on the peripheral. I wasn’t close to all the action and all the background information.
I don’t know how many of them are true.
BB: Most of them I would think. They may be exaggerated but they are probably true. People get a different perspective on things.
For instance there was a story about the two bottles of beer in Frank Crean’s Office. I got onto Frank Crean and he said, ‘I can’t remember,’ he said, ‘but if he said that that’s true then it must be.’ At first he got me to tell the story. So I didn’t get anywhere with him.
BB: I can just remember Frank Crean getting up at the Hobart Conference and announcing a tax exemption was approved, or would be approved. He got a standing ovation for that statement of course.
Well behind that was all the goings on.
BB: It was a great break through, there is do doubt about that, it was a tremendous break through. It sort of enabled credit unions to get rid of the shackles of taxation and enable them to plan to go ahead a bit, without the financial constraints anyway.
There was a number of other things, too. You know they had difficulty getting Federal Departments to give pay-roll deductions. There was the Home Savings Grants Scheme, the credit union wasn’t involved in that.
BB: No, it had to be bank deposits and so on, wasn’t it.
Now, it doesn’t matter who you are, the Federal Government will take pension cheques and what have you. Then of course the credit unions couldn’t get them through their system.
BB: Really, when you look back, they have come a long way, haven’t they in the last twenty years?
They certainly have. Now you didn’t go overseas at all?
BB: No, never.
Were you involved with the Australian Foundation at all?
BB: No. My involvement was very limited, I’m sorry.
While you were on the Board, were you anything to do with the decisions which led to, I know Les Robinson was involved mainly with it, the setting up of the central banking system?
BB: Yes.
The decision had already been taken, I think, when you went on the Board.
BB: Yes, I think it would have been. I don’t remember too much detail about it. I know that it was welcomed by the Board as a great break through because it did enable the movement itself to channel its funds through one area for the participating credit unions at least. The income derived would help to promote further expansion of the League itself and the movement.
You know about the number of services being provided now by credit unions, some of them through the League and now through AFCUL, I suppose, EDVEST and various travel services?
BB All these came on after my departure from the League Board. Some credit unions were providing travel facilities individually, but EDVEST was an idea that sort of came to fruition after I left. I think it was a talking point at that stage that they needed to do something about retirement benefits, or retirement advice. Did Terry McMannus set that up?
I’m not sure who set it up. What I was going to ask next in actual fact, is do you think that the credit unions should be offering these services more so?
BB: Yes, I do entirely. I totally subscribe to that. I think that they ought to become a one stop financial shop for anybody from the cradle to the grave virtually. They are, or they certainly were in my view, membership-oriented and they ought to be providing these services for the best for their members. I can remember just in our small credit union I used to be asked by people who were retiring what to do with their retirement funds and I had no body to call on. It was ludicrous to suggest that a person should put all their funds into their local credit union and pay tax on the full amount. But we had no other avenues of knowledge to help members in that situation. So I think it is a great idea.
What about superannuation, do you think they should get more into that area?
BB: Investing the super for members, I think so. It has always been my belief that if they could provide a worthwhile service better than anybody else then they ought to be doing it, but if they can’t do it better than anyone else then there is no point in being there. Now I felt when loan rates went up equivalent to banks, there was no point in a credit union existing if it is going to offer the same service as a bank next door. It was pointed out to me that the credit unions were providing a floor for the market, because the banks would not go higher if the credit unions didn’t. But I didn’t totally believe that concept. I feel that we’ve got to do it better and cheaper.
Do you feel that the credit unions have compromised their principles or do you think they have kept them?
BB: I think to some extent they have compromised them. I don’t necessarily believe that big is better. I think the whole world has become more commercial. Credit unions started out with, you know, personal loans. Whilst they are still being made, they are being made for more big budget items and I think that is the way the whole economy has gone.
But don’t you think they have gone in the wrong direction to some extent? For instance, at the present moment they are trying to sort of get into housing, whereas really they can’t do that unless they get into co-operative housing which they haven’t done. Only St George has done that.
BB: Well I feel that they have compromised their position. I feel that if they are going to be into housing, it ought to be at a compatible rate better than anyone else can do it. Now if that means getting into co-operative housing, that is what they ought to be doing.
Well so many people can’t get into housing, or if they can, they can’t get back into it.
BB: Well credit unions aren’t helping them and they ought to be, that is my view. I think the Common Bond is still the main part of the credit union activity and I still don’t believe because you live within a hundred kilometre radius of some particular point that ought to be sufficient Common Bond for a credit union to exist. I think it needs to be neater than that. In my view credit unions ought to be smaller and ought to providing very real services at the best price that is available. I am sorry, but I am a very low interest person. I think that interest rates ought to be kept low and savings rates ought to be kept competitive and credit unions ought to be able to do it better than anyone else.
I notice that in actual fact a lot of people are going into companies to try and do that. For instance, I notice that although people look at it as a tax dodge, I can’t see that it is, people with money, particularly the legal profession I notice, are getting together in companies to lend to their children or whatever, or their immediate circle, at low rates of interest. To invest, getting little back in order to provide the capital for them.
BB: Well that is a matter for individuals I guess. I don’t totally go along with it. I think credit unions have got to more accurately define their role and keep it to personal finance which they ought to be able to do better than anybody else. If they want to get into housing well then they have got to do that better than others.
The time that you have given to credit unions, has it had any deleterious affect on your health or your family life? Any regrets in that direction?
BB: It hasn’t had any affect on my health that I am aware of. I think my family life has suffered to some extent, because I think my relationship with my children is probably not as good as it could have been. I think we missed out on a lot of social life in Tamworth where I lived, for all of my credit union activity. I think we did miss out simply because I was away on credit union business lots of weekends, particularly over the winter period when regional meetings were on. I probably would attend three or four regional meetings in a five or six week span and other credit union activities as well as might have taken place at the time. I loved the time that I was there, but by the same token it did have some effect on my family life. My wife keeps reminding me.
So you have to pay her back for the time, have you?
BB: Well I do, that is true.
I suppose also, being on the League Board, the Association Board, that must have been harder?
BB: Yes, but it was an enjoyable time. It obviously took up quite a bit of my time. At one stage when credit unions were in financial difficulties generally, the League Board was meeting sometimes weekly and often times twice a month. This was away overnight, in my case. Plus the physical drain of getting there and all the other ramifications involved. But it was demanding for a while yet at the same time it was enjoyable.
There is one question that I keep asking people, I must sound like a stuck record the way I am going, but how do you answer the charge that credit unions are actually pushing credit along with all the other financial institutions, often to the disadvantage of the people who get it?
BB: Well I don’t think you can ever get over that while you have got different personalities involved. I would like to think that in the credit union I was involved in that wasn’t the case. But I can remember an employee of the League at the time saying that if the person wants money to play the poker machines grant them a loan. Now to me than is an anathema. It is a charge and I think it is a legitimate charge in certain circumstances. But generally, I don’t think it occurs.
Yet some credit unions at the present moment are actually suggesting independent counselling services rather than the Board or the credit union staff doing the counselling of people who have difficulties.
BB: I really feel that it ought to be up to the staff. Providing the staff has got some training in counselling matters, I feel that it is better being dealt with in-house. I don’t believe an independent organisation, unless they are well tutored in credit union ethics, would be putting the customer’s position first as opposed to the credit union wanting to lend the money. I just felt that in our own case, for instance, I always felt in our credit union I would rather lend any fund we had to members at a lower interest provided they needed it rather than invest it elsewhere, even in the League. That is the purpose for which it was set up, to help members. If you are going to push credit at them unnecessarily, it is not helping them, whether it comes from a credit union or an independent organisation.
In that, well can’t exactly call it the country, country town credit union shall we say, did you have the problems which you sometimes get in the city with finance companies and that sort of thing? Also retailers pushing credit on people who can’t really afford it?
BB: Well not in our experience. In the credit union that we had I would expect that we had about a 96 per cent, or 98 per cent employment membership credit union ratio, if I can put it that way. I would believe that all of the financial needs of those members were being dealt with through the credit union. I can hardly recall an instance where any member needed to come and get a consolidated loan.
End Tape 2b: 4687 Words: 1 hour 40 Minutes