20 JUNE 1990: ANSWCU53: RICHARD RAXWORTHY TALKING TO RAY COOPER
I will ask you Mr Cooper, where were you born and when?
RC: I was born on 9 July 1927 at the Royal North Shore Hospital, St Leonard’s.
Where did you grow up?
RC: Primarily in Cammeray in North Sydney.
What do you remember of that?
RC: Well I went to Cammeray Public School in the earlier years and then to the Marist Brothers, North Sydney. I have been a follower of North Sydney Rugby League ever since those days. One of the few North supporters in Sydney.
You and David Hill.
RC: The same fellow, yes.
Where did you go to school?
RC: At Cammeray Public School first and then Marist Brothers, North Sydney.
Did you like the schooling or not?
RC: Yes. It was during the Depression years and I remember my most vivid memory of school yard was that in our school was the dole office and the guys used to get their dole and go across to ???? to spend their dole money.
What else do you remember?
RC: Well the building of the Cammeray Bridge of course. There is a very famous bridge at Cammeray there. They tore the old bridge down where the trams used to go, they used to scale trams across the old bridge at Cammeray which went to North Bridge Golf Links. The building of that new bridge. I can remember the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. I was where North Sydney Station is now, on that corner, watching the parade. Just some of the memories of when I was very small.
What do you remember of your father and your mother? What did you father do for a living?
RC: My father was a clerk. He worked for the milk depot. Fortunately he was one of the few people in our street who had a job during the Depression. He was born in 1887 and he served in the Royal Australian Navy from 1908 to 1918. He had quite some War experiences, mostly based in Scapa Flow in Scotland. My mother was born in 1887 in Young, out in the Western Districts. Her father, he was born in the late 1850s, my grandfather, ran a bullock wagon service out there carting wool from the Blayney area to the railhead at Cowra.
When did you leave school?
RC: I left school in 1944 and joined the AIF.
Where did you go? What unit were you in?
RC: I did my training at Cowra and then at Canungra Warfare Training Camp in Queensland. Then I went to Finch Island, New Guinea. Then the War had finished and I was stuck there and a very young soldier so I volunteered and spent the next two years in Japan in the Occupation Army.
Was there anything that you remember particularly about that?
RC: Well I remember the day we arrived in Japan very annoyed with the Japanese. I remember marching from the wharf to a railway station into our barracks which based near Hiroshima we saw the people in the street and thought how ordinary the people looked. Pushing their prams and carrying their kids and going about their general business they looked like ordinary people, not like the enemy we had just sort of built up to expect and propaganderised during the War.
So when you came out, where did you go and work then?
RC: I worked for an electrical switchgear company at Mascot, Scan Electric Company. I was there for a year and then I wanted to study accountancy and I got a job with the Siemens Company, which is a world-wide famous company. I was there for some five years before going to the Electricity Commission. That is when I became involved in credit unions.
So how did you first hear about credit unions?
RC: The credit union had been operating for a couple of years. The company put out a monthly newspaper, information sheet and the credit union had a little square in that for credit union news. I used to follow this along, a little mystified of what it was all about. Then one day I was in the Internal Audit Department and I was approached that they would like an internal audit of the credit union. I remember saying, ‘What’s in it for me?’ and they said, ‘There is a one hundred quid honorarium.’ I said, ‘OK, I will take it.’ That’s how I became involved. Rather ashamedly now perhaps to say I joined the credit union for a profit.
Was that the Supervisory Committee?
RC: Yes. As such. I was it.
So where did you get your training in credit unions?
RC: Well probably at the Electricity Commission. The people who were running it then were a real great set of guys. There was Harry Head, member number one, John Hutton, Maurie Banbridge and Kevin Neal who were survey draftsmen. They had run that credit union for quite some years and I was amazed how quite successful it was. I started to learn a bit about it there. Then the Newport Schools started up not long after I joined, in the middle to late 1960s. I attended the Newport Schools and started to mix around the movement a bit.
Which one did you attend first?
RC: The very first one was a short weekend one, only three days. Guy from CUMIS came out here and we had a very short one. Then I went to all bar one after that, I think, the Newport Schools.
Do you remember any of the discussions which led to AFCUL?
RC: Well I remember being at the AFCUL meetings there with Beresford Calverley and Dermot Ryan and all those people there.
But you don’t remember the discussions that led to the formation of AFCUL?
RC: Not particularly no. I wasn’t that high up in the hierarchy at that point.
Well actually it was 1965, I think.
RC: Yes well that was just the year after I joined. I wasn’t quite into the credit unions that far then. I was just getting my formative years with the Electricity Commission group.
You didn’t have anything to do with the formation meeting of the Elcom Credit Union. Do you remember when you first went to Supervisory Committee meetings?
RC: Well I was the Supervisory Committee, as such. I attended Board meetings. It wasn’t long before I became Secretary and then Deputy-Chairman and then Chairman of the credit union.
Who put you up for Chairman?
RC: I was the first accountant involved with the credit union. The guys who I have already mentioned had been running it but were running a little bit out of steam. I had some different ideas from an accountant’s point of view and I suppose in my forthright way I started to assume control, let’s put it that way.
Did you study accountancy?
RC: Yes.
Where did you study and when?
RC: Through the Sydney Technical College initially and then I did the ASA exams.
That was while you were working for the Electricity Commission?
RC: Yes.
Did you study before the War at all, accountancy?
RC: No, I was at school.
Were you good at mathematics when you were a kid?
RC: No, not real bright at mathematics. But I did my accountancy through the CRDS.
Right. So what were the issues you remember at the time with the Electricity Commission Credit Union? Can you remember?
RC: Yes. The first matters were the lack of an Act. We were operating under the Co-operation Act at that time and that was very difficult. I remember our particular credit union had a very long name, Electricity Commission Employees Co-operative Credit Union Limited, which is a very long name to put on letterheads. There were other things of course. Initially there were no pay-roll deductions and the matters of getting that organised.
So how did you go about that?
RC: I believe the Electricity Commission people, not myself but Maurie Banbridge particularly and Harry Head, were primarily involved in getting pay-roll deductions for credit unions in government departments which eventually flowed on to private industry. They saw Pat Hills, the Member of Parliament. First of all they asked the Chief Accountant of the Electricity Commission for pay-roll deductions free of charge. He said, ‘No. You make a profit, we should charge you,’ as they charge other people for pay-roll deductions, a percentage. They refused and continued the pay-line collections. Finally then in frustration they went to Pat Hills, one of the guys knew him, in Macquarie Street. He said, ‘What’s all this nonsense.’ He got his ministerial car and went down to see the Chairman of the Electricity Commission and the next day the pay-roll deductions were approved. I understand that flowed on slowly through a number of government departments although the Railways Department hung out, as Tom Kelly will tell you, for many, many years. I think it was when the Askin Government came in that Askin made it obligatory for all government departments to provide pay-roll deductions free to credit unions.
Was there any political lobbying behind the scenes on the pay-roll deduction business?
RC: Not that I remember. I have no doubt the Association was doing something about it. I understand that the story I have just told you is fact as I know it. That is the best I know.
Were you in the union?
RC: Yes. I was in the Municipal Employees Union. I worked for the Electricity Commission itself and that was the union. You could belong to the Public Service Association. The Electricity Commission was formed of a number of groups in the early days and the MEU was for the old County Council employees and the PSA was the old Public Works people.
So who was your delegate, do you remember?
RC: No I can’t remember now.
It wasn’t Dermot Ryan, was it?
RC: No. I know it was a big tall fellow, became MLC. He was always the Parliamentarian at the Association, League meetings, the Annual General Meetings. Peter McMahon. He was the Electricity Commission delegate at the MEU. He started off as a clerk in the Pay Office or Time Keeper’s Office at the Electricity Commission. Went to work for the union and hence became an MLC.
More than that. He was working in the union to get credit unions extended all around New South Wales.
RC: Peter McMahon?
Within the union. During that period if it was a municipal type union, municipal or shire, then he would be on the platform when they started it.
RC: Everybody pushed in those days. I remember at the Electricity Commission when I joined it there was about eleven hundred members. I got so excited and enthusiastic about this that within two years I had signed up personally three thousand new members. That was done mostly at night. A lot of overtime was worked in those days. I would work from the top of the building, the twenty-storey building, the old insurance building. I would work my way down and sign everybody up whether they liked it or not. I think there were just over three thousand members I signed up in a short period.
Do you remember the starting of the various other electricity credit unions. I mean Macquarie and such like, were you involved in any of those?
RC: Not involved with their starting up, but I was involved with the amalgamations of the Wangi and Tallawara and Willawarrin credit unions with the Electricity Commission Credit Union. I didn’t believe there should be so many credit unions in the one organisation. I tried to get a merger arranged and perhaps I can claim to be the prime mover and speech maker and delegate and visitor and coercer to get those people to all join the one credit union. The Lakes held out and Elcom of course is a separate thing again, the mines credit union. I was instrumental in having those other credit unions, us four, merge.
Can you remember roughly what year that was?
RC: 1967, 1968 I think it was.
So when did you become active in the movement generally? Working on the League?
RC: Well towards 1967, 1968, I had been to a few of the Schools and such like. I got to know Stan Arneil and it was about that time when the Tom Ryan situation arose with CUNA International. Do you know about Tom Ryan. Tom Ryan was the General Manager of the Commonwealth Bank Credit Union which had left the League, disaffiliated. Tom Ryan was appointed by CUNA International as the Far East, or South East Asia representative for CUNA International. The Association members took umbrage at this, disagreeing violently with the appointment of a person not only outside the official movement, but also one who was instrumental in bringing about the disaffiliation process. That was rather an unsatisfactory situation. That was the time when they called a Special Meeting in Melbourne to talk about this. That was one of the first State things I was involved with. I flew down to Melbourne with a group of people. We stayed at a motel overnight and then came back again. Subsequently I was asked would I be interested in becoming a Director of the League as a casual vacancy appointment, which was when Stan Arneil was leaving the League.
When did you first meet Stan Arneil?
RC: The first time I can remember would have been a Newport School.
Were you ever at a meeting when he was giving the address at a formation meeting of any credit unions?
RC: No, not that I remember.
What were your impressions of him, generally?
RC: Stan Arneil was a person who would play on the emotions of people. I am a bit of a cynical person myself. I remember a particular case when the Bergengren School was raising funds. He brought Joane Naisara over from Fiji and there were tears and all sorts of things begging for money at this particular function. It didn’t impress me at all, the emotional projection he used to put on.
Did you meet Dermot Ryan round about that time?
RC: Yes. I would have met Dermot Ryan down at the Newport Schools too. I knew the Hospitality Room with Dermot and all the City Council boys. Jack Bannister and who was it who died?
Owen Jones?
RC: Owen Jones, Maurie Dailey, all those people. Met all those sort of people there. The Newport Schools would have been when you got to know everybody in the movement. Perhaps the Newport Schools will go down in history in New South Wales as the real boost to the credit union movement. Rightly or wrongly, the behavioural patterns that happened there. I remember one funny little thing that happened. I don’t know if anyone has told you, we used to make a little noise at night and a few things happened there of course. But one thing was the person in the unit next door didn’t appreciate the noise so when the classes started the next day the guy cranked his Victa mower and left it roaring away in the laneway beside the lecture room until Stan Arneil went out and threw a bucket of water over it.
Do you remember the time when the police were called?
RC: Yes. The police came. George Walters from Queensland was there. The police came and we hung their pistols and handcuffs up in the wardrobe I remember. After about three or four hours on the booze there I remember their driver was still sitting out in the car in the street.
Did you go to any other Schools at that time?
RC: I have been to Warburton School. Of course I was involved later on in the formation of the Management School, the Management Association. We used to meet at the Teachers’ Club every month.
Who was involved with you in the formation of the Management Association?
RC: Well there was Helen McIntyre and John McIntyre. Graham Humphreys. All those people there were involved in that. Somebody from Water Resources, can’t remember the name, Lloyd Matthews.
Did you go to Chapter regularly or not?
RC: Yes I used to visit Chapters. The City of Sydney Chapter at the old County Council building down there in Sussex Street, or Kent Street. I didn’t take an active, official part in Chapters. When I became a League Director of course I visited Chapters on speaking engagements, you know official functions. Visited Chapters throughout the State and particularly around Sydney.
So what are your reminiscences of your first meetings at the Association, the League as it was then? Directors’ meetings.
RC: I think it was quite clear there were factions. There was a left-wing and a right-wing, let’s put it that way. Not calling them left or right, but there was a left and right wing. There was the power group and the also rans. I was never really oriented to be a factional person. I was so enthusiastic with credit unions I was sort of down the middle. I just sort of worked for credit unions. Although I could see these factions I couldn’t understand at all why credit union people weren’t all for one and one for all. That’s why I didn’t really want to take any sides in the CUNA Mutual business because I couldn’t understand why a credit union organisation could be off-side with the rest of the movement. I just couldn’t understand that.
Do you remember for instance, there are a number of things here that may be a bit before your time, do you remember when Stan Arneil became, it was before you were a Director, a Development Officer for the Registrar’s Office?
RC: Yes. Well Clusky was the Registrar there wasn’t he? I remember for a time that he was yes.
Do you remember the argument that there was over whether Stan Arneil should resign as President while he was working for the Registrar?
RC: Vaguely I remember something about this, but I wasn’t particularly interested in those political developments that were going on. They were sort of anathema as far as I was concerned. The credit union was too important to give people a ???????? I was perhaps missing the point on these political intrigues.
Yes well it was before your time as well. It was actually as early as 1964.
RC: That was the year I was just becoming involved, yes.
So you weren’t actually a Director until after Ken Miller became President?
RC: That’s right.
How was Ken Miller as a Chairman, chairing of meetings?
RC: I had a great admiration for Ken Miller. Before him was Beresford Calverley who I thought was the enthusiaster. He perhaps was the one who got people enthused about the credit union movement. Ken Miller was a unifier. There were a lot of factions and problems then. I looked at Ken Miller as the unifier of the movement. That is when the movement started to develop. They had appointed Les Robinson as General Manager who turned out to be a boomer and the movement started ahead in leaps and bounds. Together they were both people who could get the confidence of people. People had confidence in them and saw that the Association wasn’t just a willy-nilly, money-spending costly exercise and it could produce some results. I think that Ken Miller contributed a tremendous amount as the unifier of the movement and Les Robinson as the focal point of the expansion from the point of his being General Manager of the Association. He projected a solidarity in the movement, I feel.
Do you remember particularly the insurance split?
RC: Yes. As I mentioned before I tried to keep on the peripheral of this, but of course you couldn’t help but be somewhat involved. As I mentioned before I had spent some time in Madison. My first trip overseas I went across to Madison and stayed a week as the guest of CUNA International and CUNA Mutual. We did a course at CUNA Mutual’s offices in Madison. I could see the duplicity that was going on. CUNA International lived on three cents dues and CUNA Mutual lived on insurance premium profits and they had tremendous resources. I could see this as only doing good for the movement. There again I could see these jealousies were there. I couldn’t quite understand this at all, why this had to be among credit union people. I saw a different view, perhaps a more noble situation, and perhaps being practical and being aware of the reality of life. But it hurt me a lot that there was this bickering going on. I could understand the ideas of Ken Miller and Dermot Ryan here, to establish the Australian pool. I understood how CUNA Mutual worked and its international pool but that Australia because of its nature felt that we would like to retain our funds in our pool here and have some say in its use and direction. So I kept at an arm’s length generally, although perhaps I may have been considered to be more pro-CUNA Mutual. I couldn’t understand why it had to be discarded because it was part of the movement. I found it very hard to do that.
Did you generally speaking support Stan Arneil at that time as Manager?
RC: Well I saw no harm in Stan being Manager. I wasn’t privy to perhaps some of the situations that evolved between him and the Association people, Ken Miller and such like and Dermot Ryan at AFCUL. I wasn’t privy to those Executive conferences and such like. Apparently a lot of animosity developed there, obviously. I regarded Stan Arneil as a genuine credit union person. But also Stan Arneil would go off at a tangent a bit and I would say he was subject to tremendous emotions, from his experiences of the War and such-like as we all know.
He was in the position where he was meat in the sandwich to some extent because he had accepted the managership of CUNA Mutual-CUMIS in Australia. He had to contend with the methods that had been wished on him by the management in America. One of the things was that they could deal with credit unions in a number of ways. They could deal with them directly or they could deal with them through the League.
RC: Well of course in those times still the League was expected to be the central focal point and any matters like this should have been dealt through the League. Otherwise you have this split authority. The League, to assert that authority, felt that there was a conflict if CUNA Mutual pursued that policy. I can understand that. But whether it was over-emphasised I don’t know. Looking back now perhaps all of us might think it may have been a bit trivial. I don’t know who won, if anybody did, out of the whole thing really.
Well it happened in America beforehand didn’t it?
RC: Well going back in history you will start to find, read more and more, people keep repeating the same mistakes.
So when you went to America first in 1969, what do you remember of that trip?
RC: We were then under the old system of CUNA International. We were in District Twelve. My main memory is that I was required to give a talk on the disposition of the assets of CUNA International in the formation of the World Council which was mooted. The motions were going forward hopefully for the next year, 1970. I had to go this strange forum and make a speech. I do speak rather quickly, a lot faster then than I do know actually. I remember having to put the brakes really on while they translator was translating all I had to say into Spanish. When I read the transcript back I was quite amazed what a good speech it was, but I think it may have been tampered with a bit. At the Detroit meetings it was a little confusing because of the American way, the parliamentary rules and such like. But I thought it was very well conducted and was quite impressed with the whole procedure. It was all carried out very well. But the person I was most impressed with was Dermot Ryan. The Americans argued and argued and argued about this formation of World Council and there were people approaching the microphone. I was sitting next to Dermot Ryan at the delegates’ table and he was sketching his famous drawings of his little cat in front of the fire. He was drawing a little cat with the ears and another little cat next to him. He did a bit of sketching and for most of the three days we sat there he just did his sketchings. I said, ‘Bloody Dermot Ryan’s come all the way over to America to draw ruddy cats and all this important business is being transacted.’ Then towards the end of the last day Dermot says, ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ So he walks over and stood in front of a microphone waiting for a call. After three days of arguments of all these pluses and minuses Dermot said, ‘Now Mr Chairman I put it this way, what you have all been up here bloody arguing about is this, this and this versus that, and that and that.’ Within three to five minutes he had them eating out of his hand and they gave him a standing ovation. The whole matter was resolved, the motions were passed and we all went down the pub. The World Council was virtually established. I would say that Dermot Ryan closed the debate. He put the gag by capsulising the whole three days into about five minutes. If he had done it on the Monday we would have got home a lot earlier. That is how I remember standing in the Cobo Hall there in Detroit. I was there a couple of months ago and I was looking for Cobo Hall again and I was thinking of that 1969 speech of Dermot’s. I didn’t know then that Dermot had died, because he died when I was away at about this time. I was in Detroit a few months ago and there is the Cobo Hall still sitting there on the Detroit River and I was thinking of Dermot’s speech. How I think that he capsulised that whole week’s debate, international meeting, and squashed it in a few minutes flat. He was an amazing man.
You didn’t have Ken Miller that year did you?
RC: No. It was Clarrie Stewart, Nev Daniels from Wollongong, myself, Dermot Ryan and Tom Kelly of course was there. After the meetings we went to Madison to have a bit of a look around the headquarters. Everybody makes a pilgrimage to Madison the first trip to America. We spent some time with Supply Department there with CUNA Mutual.
How did you get on with Tom Kelly? He is different again isn’t he?
RC: Well Tom Kelly is a gentleman’s gentleman and Tom and I have always been very good friends. You could never have a conflict with Tom Kelly I don’t think other than in a very, very friendly way.
He had his problems with the Board generally shortly after that.
RC: Well I mentioned earlier about factions. I think Tom was not in the power faction. Yet he was so highly respected he was accepted for things like getting voted to go to America for instance. Tom would always be included. He was Secretary of District Twelve I think at the time. Tom was highly respected and included where necessary because of the outstanding contribution be could make. But I think he was on the Board with Kevin Yates. There was Kevin Yates, Tom Kelly and a couple of others who were not of the faith.
Well they were of the Faith.
RC: I didn’t mean that Faith. I didn’t mean the religious Faith.
Can you remember what the row with Tom Kelly was over between Ken Miller and Dermot and the others and Tom who was also Vice-President?
RC: No, I wasn’t privy to that.
It was public as well. Do you remember him being Editor of Quest?
RC: Oh yes quite well, of course. Quest was another problem situation. Quest was developed and the idea was tremendous but the wrong people got hold of it. The fellow from the Herald was a rabid left-wing communist. The paper was used to push a political side and it was drawing credit unions to become politically aligned which I disagreed with. I have never had anything to do with politics, Labor, Liberal, anything. I have always objected to credit unions being associated directly with any political wing. I have never liked credit unions being involved with trade unions either, directly with trade unions. That is why Stan Arneil came unstuck again by being involved in the SDA debacle.
You say that you thought it was very left-wing. I have been reading Quest recently and I can’t see that it was particularly left-wing at all.
RC: Well to me it just seemed to push that line.
There is one thing that I believe Tom Kelly lost his Vice-Presidency over and that was his using Quest to push the co-operative bank after the Board had voted it down.
RC: Well Tom Kelly would know. Tom Kelly had the little habit that if he believed in something strong enough, even though the Cabinet voted against it, Tom would still pursue the idea, even though the matter was completed, ruled against. I think Tom went to Israel once to try and raise some money for this co-operative bank and he did some so-called official business unofficially which wasn’t appreciated. There again it didn’t do much harm because he couldn’t do much without the whole authority of the Board. He could do as much as he liked in negotiating and organising but he couldn’t get the final imprimatur without the Board going along with it, so he was wasting his time really.
End Tape 1A: 5053 Words: 2 hours.
20 JUNE 1990: ANSWCU53: RICHARD RAXWORTHY TALKING TO RAY COOPER
I was talking to you about your trip to America in 1969 first. Where did you go on the trip as you started from Australia?
RC: I travelled initially with Clarrie Stewart and we went to Honolulu first, Hawaii. To Los Angeles and did the Disneyland bit. I met some very nice Americans there who took us everywhere, all over the place, to Hollywood and the whole business and then Disneyland. We met the mob up in San Francisco and we had a great time there. Dermot Ryan would have remembered the squabble down in Market Street with Clarrie Stewart and Nev Daniels. We hired a cab there, the whole five of us, and drove all over San Francisco for $25 for the whole day. We had to drive the cab back because the cab driver couldn’t drive after we had been to Solsalido.
Who drove?
RC: I forget now. It was a bit of a mess anyhow. We ended up in a screaming match at the Nickelodeon Museum at Seal Rocks near the Golden Gate Bridge where there are these old nickelodeons. Clarrie Stewart got all these nickels and filled all the machines at once and they were all bipping and screaming and little organs going, these old ancient machines. People were starting to laugh and Dermot Ryan had to run for the toilet, I think he almost had an accident in his pants, making for the toilet he was laughing that much. We had had a few turpses during the day. That was the bad Australian image of being a tourist I think. That was San Francisco. We met Tom Kelly and then we travelled on the midnight flight to Detroit. I remember Dermot Ryan wheeling Clarrie Stewart into the Cadillac Hotel, which I think we stayed at in Detroit, in a wheelchair. Clarrie Stewart was a little small fellow and when he sort of curled himself up he looked like a wise and old little man. Dermot Ryan took him down in the foyer and let him go in this wheelchair and let him go at about forty miles and hour down to the reception desk. That was rather frowned on too by the people in the hotel at six-thirty in the morning. Detroit wasn’t in a happy place. We were told not to go more than one off the block because of the riots and such like that had been happening. It was only a few weeks after the Ken State University riots in Chicago and we weren’t all that far from there. In Detroit there had been riots in the areas there and you couldn’t go off the hotel block at night, it was too dangerous to go out at night there.
You mentioned that you got yourself into a fight with Dermot Ryan on one occasion, was that in America?
RC: That was on the corner of Market Street down in San Francisco. We had a bit of squabble, a difference of opinion, about why we were there. We weren’t sort of going about our business, there was too much wasting of time. Again I think I was a bit over-enthusiastic about doing the job I was sent to do, perhaps. Also associated with a bit of Buddweiser.
Were there actually a number of blows struck?
RC: Oh not really. I think there was a push and shove and I think Clarrie Stewart and Nev Daniels were holding each of us.
I will have to ask Nev Daniels about that.
RC: I think Nev will remember, yes.
Where did you go next?
RC: After Detroit we went back to Madison. As I mentioned before we spent some time with CUNA International. They showed us around the Supply Department. We saw the archives. Saw an old copy of a letter they had sent from the old CUNA to the State Government of New South Wales in 1918. An early inquiry about credit unions in New South Wales. A letter from the New South Wales Government dated 1918 is in the library of the old CUNA International library there.
Who did he send it to, because CUNA wasn’t going then?
RC: Well whatever the Association was then there was an old archive letter there about credit unions back in 1918. I remember seeing the letter. We spent four or five days as the guest of CUNA Mutual going through their spiel of all their insurance services and the credit union promotional aids and such like. We spent some nice times in Charlie Compton’s home and Carlos Matos’ home with Owen Schripe. I remember visiting Owen Schripe and such like, all those people there. They were very courteous to us and made us feel quite at home. Madison is a beautiful town of course and at that time of the year, in the spring, it is very nice. From there Nev Daniels and I set off via Chicago to Washington and did the Washington tourist bit. Then up to New York and we did the tourist bit there. Then across to London, down to Rome. I left Nev in Rome, he was going home. I went on to Zurich and Munich. then I was supposed to go on to Vienna and Moscow but I got tired and went back to Hong Kong. I met Clarrie Stewart there. He had gone the other way round the world, he had gone via Seattle and Honolulu. I met Clarrie Stewart in the bar in the hotel in Hong Kong.
In Hong Kong did you visit the League there?
RC: Yes visited the League there. Andrew So Quok Wing, or Andrew Wing So Quok, was running the League then with the assistance of Father John Collins who had been a missionary in China prior to the Communist takeover in 1949. Amazing Irishman. He spoke Chinese better than a Chinaman. A Chinaman without looking at him could not tell he wasn’t Chinese. They were very active in Hong Kong because they have got quite a number of government departments. The Ferry Workers and the Brewery and the such like. They showed us around Hong Kong and we visited a couple of credit unions in these development blocks. I addressed a Chapter meeting there and my credit union at the time had given me one hundred US dollars to make a donation there and that was a lot money to them and they were very appreciative of that. We showed the flag and I remember having my picture in the local Hong Kong newspaper for visiting Hong Kong and visiting credit unions.
Is that the only time you went to Hong Kong, or did you go there later?
RC: No I went to Hong Kong the next year also when I was on the way back from Madison the next year. I came from Moscow, Tokyo to Hong Kong that way.
So you went back from Hong Kong direct to Australia did you?
RC: Yes.
Did you make a report when you got back?
RC: Yes. My report said that I was very impressed with the tour. I felt that the number of delegates that came from here, there were five Director delegates, I thought whilst they were all valuable to make a contributions I think the Association was growing so effectively then under Les Robinson that I think my report says, I think you will find, ‘that I recommend that at least one or two of the League paid permanent staff be included as delegates in some way.’ Perhaps they could contribute on a more continuing basis because Directors are subject to elections and can disappear. I felt that the loss of any valued information they would have would be better retained by permanent staff. That was one of the recommendations. I think there were things starting to develop, particularly central banking which was being thought of then, we were still playing around with the Stabilisation Fund, or the Reserve Board as it is called now. I thought these things could be developed better by permanent staff and trained staff. They were matters when I made the report. I thought the delegation could be reduced from volunteer Directors to include staff.
Before we go to the next year you brought up two things that we might as well deal with now. One is the Stabilisation Fund. Do you remember who reported on that and when?
RC: No. I think it was mostly in the hands of Ken Miller. He was handling that pretty well.
Well it was Dermot Ryan who put the original report.
RC: But I think the League Executive were working on that particularly rather than the Board at large. Still I was still running the other credit union and doing my own job. That was an Association matter perhaps, with Les Robinson.
What about the other reports that were around at that time, like the one for a Collection Service?
RC: Well all these matters, I was only associated with these when they were discussed at League Board meetings as such, as a League Director around the League table. So I wasn’t really involved. Very much of the work was done by the Executive. They worked overtime to do most of the Executive work with the General Manager.
The central banking system, that had already been developed completely by that time?
RC: No. There was no central banking in 1969. We had heard of it. Tom Kelly was playing around with this co-operative banking idea. Then we knew that in Canada they had a type of central banking system. That is what I will mention in the next trip.
The central banking system report was brought back in 1963 by Don Harvey.
RC: Well he would have been reporting on some of the systems they had in some of the United States on their own, or State-centrals, or in Canada where the Caisse place is of course but not running for years. But the Canadian, well the Toronto League particularly was developing a fairly sophisticated system for those days.
But of course it was Les Robinson who actually built it up.
RC: Well that is what happened the next year. When I talk about 1970 I can mention that.
So do you want to go on then to 1970 when you went overseas again?
RC: Well in 1970 I was elected to attend as a delegate to the World Council meeting as it turned out to be then. That was in Madison, Wisconsin. We spent the week there. From there I went to Toronto, the Toronto League, as a guest there for a few days. We looked quite heavily at their central banking system and how it worked. For those days it was quite sophisticated but very cumbersome. The Association virtually had to do all the processing of all the paper work, including all the clearing of the cheques. That is different from our central banking system as we understand it here. My report that came back from there was that it was definitely necessary for Les Robinson to go there and see this and look at any other central banking systems operating. From that Les did go to North America and shortly after that the central banking scheme was set up with the negotiations first with Westpac, who turned it down, and then the ANZ Bank who were actually the successful initial operators of the system. I don’t remember exactly when it started now, was it late 1970, early 1971?
Well what I have been told is that it started originally before Les Robinson was Manager.
RC: Not the central banking system with all the centralised chequeing systems we know now.
I am saying it was started before that.
RC: I know the old central bank deposit, but I am talking about the actual banking system where we were doing through the banking system itself the cheque clearing and such like. I didn’t mean the deposit and lending system. That was going of course. I was talking about central banking as a fringe banker itself.
Well Les Robinson was the one that set up, yes.
RC: Yes he went to North America in late 1970 I think it was after we got back. We were there in May and he went late 1970. It would have been set up shortly after that.
Well in 1970 when you were again overseas with Col Day, Pat Egan and Ken Miller.
RC: One of the sad things happened there at the meeting, and here again I could never understand. We were appointing the initial delegates to the World Council and Laurel Bruce from Jamaica of course had been a man amongst men. One of the pillars of the credit union movement, so to speak, one of the pillars of Rhodes so to speak. I remember having the meeting there with Ken Miller. We were called together and Graham Benson was there and they said they were not going to vote for Laurel Bruce. They were going to vote for, I can’t remember his name now it is how distinct it was, the fellow from Brazil. The Australian delegation voted for this fellow from Brazil on the first World Council Board to the detriment of Laurel Bruce. I have never seen a man so broken in all my life when the numbers were called up and he missed out being a Director of the first World Council. Why we did that I have never understood.
Was there any discussion?
RC: Well there were reasons given. I can’t remember now. I think I was so numbed by the whole situation, the jolly rule situation, that we went along with it. But I can never understand why. Because Laurel Bruce being a man who bounces back is now back in the forefront and it is very nice to see him down in Melbourne in 1988 there when he was honoured for his services to the credit union movement at the AFCUL meeting in Melbourne in 1988. A very distinguished man.
So where did you go first in that trip?
RC: Well we straight to San Francisco and then straight across to Madison. The meetings were held there in Madison. There again we had problems there that year too. There were riots. I remember the day we arrived we were picked up by Romo de Michelle, he was another contentious figure in the credit union movement. Romo was with the World Extension Department, worked for Paddy Bailey. He picked us up in his old dilapidated car. He reminds me of Colombo, he was an old bloke in an old raincoat and old car. His car was all covered in chicken wire. We asked why and he told us we would find out. We are driving down Madison’s main street and the whole place is rioting with university students. There were cars tipped over. Everybody is driving down in cars with chicken wire all over them to stop stones smashing the windows. We got out of the car and the whole place reeked of tear gas. There were helicopters flying over and the Reine Hotel on the Main Square, opposite Parliament House there, where we stayed there were eight thousand National Guardsmen parked outside our hotel. University Avenue, which runs off there right up to the University was just barricaded with about six wrecked motor vehicles all tipped over as a barricade. So that wasn’t a real pleasant stay in Madison there when the University riots were on.
That was where the meeting was. What was significant about the meeting do you remember?
RC: Well of course the World Council formed and this became a bit of a sort of a let down after the Detroit meeting the year before and Dermot Ryan’s famous clearing of the air. The World Council was formed and the first President was elected and we all went home. There wasn’t a great lot of business involved at all. It was all put to committees and such like to work all the hard bits out after, you know as they usually do in these things.
So where did you go next?
RC: I went up to Toronto to look at their central banking system, the actual centralised cheque clearing system that the Toronto League was running. The Ontario League was running in Toronto. We were quite impressed with this, even though it appeared cumbersome. That’s where the report evolved that we brought back to recommend that the General Manager Les Robinson get over to North American smartly to see what we could do about, which he subsequently did. The system we have today evolved from that particular exercise we feel. From there I went across to Paris and Vienna and Moscow on the way home. I went to Tokyo. Tried to find Mrs Tamaso in the Sofia University, but she was on holidays at the time. Then down to Hong Kong to visit Andrew So again, and then home.
You mentioned Tokyo.
RC: There is a credit union at the Sofia University. The Sofia University is a private university in Tokyo. It is not far from the ????, a tiny hotel actually. Mrs Tomaso was there for years. She was a contact. They were a member of CUNA International too. She was running a credit union but I wasn’t able to find her.
What about Russia, why particularly did you go there? Were there any credit unions in Russia?
RC: I couldn’t find any credit unions in Russia. I found one in Rome at the Agriculture and Food Organisation just down near the Colosseum. There is a credit union down there behind the Colosseum near the Circus Maximus. There is an office down there. At the United Nations there was a credit union run by a Canadian, as a matter of fact. In Moscow I couldn’t find any there. Actually I was on my own and I was terrified in Moscow that I could disappear off the streets. It was very early tourist days, 1970. I was staying in the Hotel Russia just off Red Square and the table I had for dinner had a North Vietnamese, two Russians and an American whom I shared a table with. I was wearing a tie I remember I bought here at David Jones with kangaroos on to give away. The North Vietnamese bloke wasn’t impressed at all because he knew about Australians being in Vietnam at the time. Anyway the three of four days I was in Moscow I walked through the Kremlin and saw all this sort of stuff but I was always worried I was going disappear and I wasn’t real happy until I got of the Aeroflot flight in Tokyo and walked through the gate into the Tokyo Terminal.
You went that time on the 1970 world trip with Col Day. How well did you know him?
RC: Oh well at that time I had become Manager of the Sydney County Council Credit Union and Col Day was the Chairman. We were both League Directors and we were both appointed to go on that trip. I had already been appointed when I was still with the Electricity Commission just about Christmas. I had only just taken over the position at the Sydney County Council as full time and that was why there was two of us from the one credit union going on trip. Col and I become quite good friends in spite of. I say in spite of because Col Day was terribly disappointed in not being appointed to the position of Manager that I got. He couldn’t help but feel a little animosity in regard to that. Col Day was a generation way back. He still lived in the hard days of the Depression. As a credit union person he was ideal I suppose because he knew about the hard times that ordinary working man would cop. If you didn’t have it you were already down, if you had it you were all right. Col was a real fighter for the working man.
Is he still around?
RC: Col died about a year or so ago. He retired from the County Council. He did become General Manager of the credit union. He retired and went to live at Long Jetty and unfortunately Col passed on a year or so ago.
What about Pat Egan, how did you get on with him?
RC: Well Pat Egan, of course being a country delegate, I only met him when he came down for his League meetings once a month and having just travelled on that trip. Pat was a man’s man too. He could probably tell you more about Col Day than I can because they were very good friends. As I say it was only on that trip that Pat Egan and Ron Murray travelled up to Canada together, we did the trip to Canada together. They came with us.
Now perhaps you might tell me about the time that you were Manager of the Sydney County Council Employees Credit Union. What was the main things that happened during your time there as Manager?
RC: Well the Sydney County Council Credit Union was very heavily subsidised. They had a small staff when I came there. Being the ambitious person again the first thing was to get space. By dint of collusion and assistance of the Directors, the Directors were quite co-operative and the management of the County Council, eventually I got about a quarter of a whole floor in the George Street building for the credit union office. Counters were built and the staff grew from about four when I went there to I think it was twelve of sixteen. So we built the credit union up from about two and a half, three thousand members to over six thousand and more than doubled the assets in the three years I was virtually managing the credit union. 1970 to 1973, three years, almost four years.
So that was a time of expansion?
RC: Yes this built the credit union up. It had no facilities, it had no one directing it really except the Directors. They hadn’t got much time so I went in as the first full-time Director-Manager and was able to put the efforts into development. Percy Ward was the Development Officer and a couple of good guys we had there. Good staff and the credit union really grew when we got the word out. It was just a matter of publicity. It was just telling people the credit union was there.
How about the time also when there was the League Collection Service was starting. Did you take part in that?
RC: No. I wasn’t involved with that.
Who was your credit union, the Sydney County Council, insuring with?
RC: We were insuring through the Association, I think initially. We had CUNA Mutual for a while because I know we got the first payment for somebody who had died with a full $4,000 loan. I remember Stan Arneil bringing the cheque in within seven days of the person dying. The person died and they gave us $4,000 and he brought the cheque in straight away.
Was that CUNA Mutual through the League or CUNA Mutual direct?
RC: No it would be have been through the League I think because County Council did everything through the League. They were very League oriented.
When the League decided that CUNA Mutual was not the best deal and got another deal, did the Sydney County Council Credit Union move and stay with the League or not?
RC: Yes the County Council followed the League along on the League advice. We belonged to the League and contributed to the League and subscribed to its ideals and we had Directors on the Board of the League so everything the League did the County Council went along with. Not rightly or wrongly, because I think mostly the League was right anyhow, as it happened.
So after that you went to Universal didn’t you?
RC: Here first. I was at the League for a year with Les Robinson.
You were working under Les Robinson?
RC: Yes.
As his assistant?
RC: Yes.
What was your title?
RC: Assistant General Manager.
What was the main job that you had to do during that time?
RC: Well I was handling initially central banking loans. Dealing with the credit unions with the volumes and such like and collection of those. I was supposed to be in charge of the financial section, the accounting area.
Little bit like financial controller was it?
RC: Yes. Reg Fowler was actually the Accountant at that time. I was assisting Les in any subject that came up. This building was being built and it was a big bugbear too. This building was under construction and we were contracted to buy this building. As a matter of fact I signed the cheque for this building actually. I was one of the signatures on the cheque that paid for this building.
Do you remember the controversy over the buying of this building, or of the use of Savings Protection Fund for the building?
RC: Well vaguely yes. I know that the meetings said that the money should not be directed in that direction, whether it was safe or not. I vaguely remember now. It had disappeared from my memory. Lots of people made a terrible lot of noise about things that when you look back were so insignificant, looking back now.
I don’t think it was because they used the money for the building as such. What they were on about, I think, was the fact that it wasn’t so quickly convertible.
RC: Well they felt that the money was there for a particular purpose. If it was needed in a hurry where would you get it from? The argument was of course the building was so substantial you could raise money quickly on it anyhow.
It was carried I know. You actually signed the cheque?
RC: Yes I signed the cheque. The balance of the payment was $2.1 million or $1.8 million. I forget the exact sum. There were two signatories and I was one of the signatures to the cheque that paid the final payment on this building, anyhow.
Who was the other one?
RC: It was either Les Robinson or Reg Fowler. I am not too sure now whether it was one of the Directors, it might have been Ken Miller. I am not too sure now.
So what did you have to do? Did you have much to do with the Directors during the time that you were Assistant Manager?
RC: No not directly. Only when Les Robinson was off, I had to deputise for him. I deputised once at the AFCUL meeting in Hobart when Les was sick. But I was only here for less than a year.
Which year was that?
RC: 1974.
So that meeting at Hobart must have been the one when Frank Crean arrived there. Can you describe the meeting?
RC: I remember Frank. Helen McIntyre probably told the story about Frank Crean. Didn’t Helen tell you about it. We had a twenty-fifth breakfast at the Hilton and she reminded us of the story that she had made a big clanger. You will have to ask Helen because it is important. It is one of those faux pas, dropping a clanger when you are on the stage in front of a couple of hundred people. Helen will tell you the story. I think you should ask her.
I think she might have covered it, I am not sure.
RC: She would have. I am pretty sure. Just can’t remember who it was now. It was a bit of a clanger and she dropped a clanger. I don’t remember anything of any great particular importance that evolved from Hobart that stays in my memory.
Well you remember Frank Crean and why he was there?
RC: Not particularly.
That is when he announced the tax exemption.
RC: Oh Frank Crean. Of course. I can see him down on the stage there now. I was at the League dinner at Waverley. Whitlam was there as a guest and we were asking him about getting exemption and such like. Of course Quest was running it all the time. So Frank Crean announced that credit unions would be exempt from income taxes, yes.
Were you aware of the efforts of Vince Martin and of Dermot Ryan?
RC: Oh yes, very much so. It was continual lobbying. They wore a track to Canberra and such like and Dermot lived down in Vince Martin’s office for a while I believe, virtually, lobbying for such an important matter. I don’t think credit unions have ever realised, and those credit unions that always criticise, they just didn’t realise how much money the movement was saving by that small effort. Over the years millions of dollars has been saved by the credit union movement to allow its better development from the efforts of just those few people.
Were you involved in any of the lobbying for the Credit Union Act which came about in 1969?
RC: A little bit. We were quite close to Clusky’s office, the Registrar’s office. We used to be in Kindersley House then. Beresford Calverley asked me to go through it. He gave me a good questionnaire sheet to write some notes and comments on various aspects of the Act that were involved. I sat through a few of the Parliamentary sessions when it was being debated. It was always three o’clock in the morning for some unknown reason, as was the Stamp Duty Act. Do you remember the English used to have it years ago. We were unsuccessful about that at that time. I know Beresford Calverley was on the Committee and he did ask a lot of people to make comments on a questionnaire he had issued out at the time.
You were never at any of the delegations at all that went to the Ministers?
RC: No.
Were you on the Credit Union Advisory Committee at all?
RC: No.
Were you on the Savings Protection Fund Committee at all?
RC: No.
Were you party to any of the moves that resulted in Dermot Ryan’s resignation from his position as Chief Executive of AFCUL?
RC: No.
Didn’t know anything about it?
RC: I knew something was going on there. But I wasn’t involved. There again, I used to try and keep away from those intrigues with the League Executive. You know, Ken Miller and who was it then, Ron Birch. Whoever was on the League Executive. I forget who was on the League Executive of that year, 1974.
Jack Coyne.
RC: Yes Jack Coyne was there, that’s right. That is where most of the work was done.
Did you have anything to do with AFCUL apart from attending the Annual Meeting?
RC: Not directly no. Not really.
Were you at the Annual Meeting when Dermot Ryan was given his presentation?
RC: Which year was that?
1975, the following year.
RC: 1975, I don’t think so, no.
Canberra it was.
RC: Oh was that at the Park Royal?
I don’t know where it was. All I know it was in Canberra.
RC: I know I went to one at the Park Royal in Canberra. That was the year that I would have been there.
I think it was the Park Royal.
RC: I think I am vaguely aware of it being read out, the usual thing.
But apart from that they had a whole lot of presentations to him and his wife as well. I did it my way and all that sort of thing.
RC: If that was the Park Royal I was there.
But you don’t remember the presentations.
RC: No it is a bit of a blank there. I was going through a little bit of a traumatic situation in my own credit union life and personal life at that time.
What was the problem in the credit union life?
RC: It was all mixed together. I was getting divorced. I had quite an upheaval from 1973 right through to 1976. Quite an upheaval in the family.
You were working here at that time for the one year. Now what else do you remember of the year you worked here? Did you get on all right with Les Robinson?
RC: Oh yes. Saw him the other day too. He is not too bad. He is not real well but he is going all right.
He is on the list but he reckons he is not going to talk until Ken Miller comes back from New Guinea.
RC: He wants to defer his talk does he. Well don’t leave it too long, because Les is not a well man you know. He would have lots of things to say.
Well I have been on to him half a dozen times. Now he has promised for July, but I don’t have a definite date.
RC: I would say just ring him up and say ‘Can I come to your home tomorrow morning at nine o’clock and just do it.’
I have already tried that.
RC: Get someone like Helen McIntyre to pressure him, they are good friends.
No it is between Ken Miller and him. He and Ken Miller want to do one together.
RC: That would be a good idea.
End Tape 1B: 5600 Words: 2 hours 5 minutes.
20 JUNE 1990: ANSWCU54: RICHARD RAXWORTHY TALKING TO RAY COOPER
Were you involved with the Australian Foundation at all?
RC: No not directly. I was at some of the General Meetings when they were discussing its purposes and such like and how it could be developed. Originally of course it was to do with our friends in Fiji, to try and help them out there. The Bergengren School of course was one of the initial sort of things from which the Foundation developed perhaps. The work that was done in developing the Bergengren School.
Did you go to Fiji at all?
RC: Yes. I went with Stan Arneil. One of the my first trips. It was 1968, September 1968. We had a trip across to Suva. Started in Suva and visited the site of the Bergengren School, where the Bergengren School was to be built. Unfortunately although I have been to Fiji since but I have never been up to the site to see the completed School. I was on the site and stood there and had a look where it was going to be built there. The Fijians treated us well as credit unions visitors. We went through all the necessaries. Went to a General Meeting of the Fiji League in Suva. Met Father Ganey. That was the first time I met Father Ganey, of course. I was naturally impressed. Although there again you have reservations whether his zeal and such like in controlling the credit unions, thinking back now, was real condescending to them.
Do you remember, going back to 1968 then, that Stan Arneil was trying to start an Association of Credit Union Leagues in the South Pacific?
RC: Yes I remember that. The Association of Credit Unions in the South Pacific.
Credit Union Leagues.
RC: Yes, Leagues. There was New Zealand, Fiji, Samoa, Australia, of course. New Guinea was sort of being developed there then to. I think that was involved in it.
You had nothing to do with it?
RC: Not directly no. Only in the discussions in the group that was there. The group that was in Fiji. Also subsequently at the meetings we had here, the different things come up in discussions at meetings here in Australia.
You didn’t go on the trip later on when Graham Benson went?
RC: No I only went to Fiji officially the once in 1968. I called through there in 1969 and 1970. I have been back since on a cruise, just visiting Suva.
Anything else that you remember with Stan Arneil about trying to raise money at that period? Apparently that was why it didn’t get enough money.
RC: I knew that Westpac were willing to put up about $20,000 for the Bergengren School part I remember. $20,000 if we could raise the other about $40,000 was estimated then. I think CUNA Mutual was going to come to the party with some. Think we got the Bergengren School built because CUNA Mutual footed most of the bill. They got most of the business too, I believe. But that is business I suppose. As for raising money for the Foundation after that, I am not aware of what happened after that.
Do you remember anything else before we leave this period? Do you remember anything more of the time that you were working at the League?
RC: No. I just remembered this building be developed here.
Do you remember moving into the building?
RC: I remember the day we closed over in Burwood Road and the day we transferred across here. I remember that very well.
What was the building like in Burwood Road?
RC: Oh it was reasonably comfortable. It served the purpose for the time we had it. It served its purpose.
Were you computerised accounting over there at that time?
RC: No.
Not even batch?
RC: No. It was all done on accounting machines there then.
What sort of accounting machines, can you remember?
RC: No I don’t remember the name of them now. Some fancy ones. Reg Fowler used to know all about them down there, in his corner of the big room there. I can’t remember them now. Probably Burroughs I think.
What about here?
RC: I didn’t work in this building. I left about the time this building was opened.
Where did you go then?
RC: I went down to Universal Credit Union for the best part of twelve months. Worked under Tom Kelly. They had a struggle. I went in there to try and do some work down there. They had terrible trouble with their ledger balancing and such like. Their overheads were terribly heavy there where they were in Angel Place.
Why did you leave here, by the way?
RC: I don’t know.
Do you mean you can’t remember?
RC: Well as I mentioned I had a life crisis.
You left?
RC: I left.
You applied for the job at Universal?
RC: Yes. I don’t remember how it exactly come up now. I know I contacted Tom Kelly when they were looking for somebody and I said, ‘Can I give you a hand for a while?’ So I went down there.
Carry on with the problems that they had.
RC: Well nothing would balance there. They were on the batch system with DP&S with the computer. Remember the old punch machine there, the old tape punches. There was terrible trouble trying to balance with the ledgers going wrong. As I said the staff weren’t that competent over all and it needed drastic development. But the avenues for development were fairly limited with the resources available and it was strangling on itself. Towards the end of that year, and this was 1975, I got in touch with Les Robinson and said, ‘This is not going to work here. They can’t afford me and a car and everything else. I think they should put it under League administration.’ Pat Taylor, who was in the League then, was running a system where they could administer credit unions and I recommended strongly that it be administered. Be taken under administration, which it subsequently was.
Under the Common Board?
RC: Yes.
Now who were the Directors at that time?
RC: The Chairman was a fellow named Nelson, some barrister fellow. I can’t remember his first name now. Most credit union people would remember him vividly from his long speeches on the budget at the Annual General Meetings of the League. He would always get up and make a long speech and it was all wrong and held the meeting up. Tom Kelly was on the Board. The others I can’t remember.
Was Kevin Yates still on the Board?
RC: I think he was then. I think he was.
When did you first meet Kevin Yates?
RC: I think it was at a League meeting here when I became a League Director. He was a League Director at the time I became a League Director in 1968. I don’t remember specifically meeting him before then.
Were you friendly with him?
RC: Oh yes I was friendly with him. I knew Kevin. He lived down the North Shore way, my way. Kevin thought not the way I used to think. Again Kevin Yates was a gentleman’s gentleman and non-controversial. I think he found it difficult to stand up to the strong people. The strength of the League when I was associated with it were the Dermot Ryan’s and Ken Miller’s, very strong people and credit union politically. I think the Tom Kelly’s and the Kevin Yates’ were more to use the word docile people compared with people of the strength of say Dermot Ryan.
You were never a member of Universal?
RC: No.
It was mainly based on the Catholic Church.
RC: It was originally set up in the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney. When I went there of course it had become a semi-mutual or industrial. It had members of the Hoover factory for instance at Meadowbank, the employees there were in it. There were a couple of other places, but I forget them now.
They had pay-roll deductions?
RC: Yes.
Did you used to make service calls?
RC: Yes. We had a Development Officer, what was his name, I forget it. But it was badly serviced and the overheads were tremendous.
The building, where were the actual premises at the time?
RC: The old Hooker’s Offices. My office was the Hooker’s office in Angel Place. The Angel Arcade. The building there which has just been pulled down. It backed on to George Street and Pitt Street.
Wasn’t that the building which had been Dorman Long’s building years before?
RC: I am not too sure. The man who built the Harbour Bridge you mean. I didn’t know that.
I remember the number that is all.
RC: Yes. Well it is next to the Liberal Party headquarters in Ashe Street there one side. Then you went through in the Arcade there. A fine old building it was. On the sixth floor we were.
It is a pity they pulled that down isn’t it.
RC: A big hole now.
Another one. A big glass chunk shortly.
RC: Yes. So after Universal.
Well a bit more about Universal if you don’t mind. What other problems were there? I mean did you get co-operation from the Directors?
RC: Yes. They left me to my own devices generally. I didn’t agree with some of the loan policies. The loans were always handled directly by Nelson, the Chairman. He set the policies and they were fairly stringent and fairly restrictive, as I remember.
Were you able to grant loans yourself?
RC: No the Directors kept that priority to themselves. That was what I objected to. They would lend the money but I had to collect them. Some credit unions still do that. I know a very large one that still does that. The Directors approve the loans out, or Loans Committees as such, and the Managers are expected to collect them.
Was there a Supervisory Committee there?
RC: Yes there was one. There was nothing much done there.
How did you get on with Tom Kelly?
RC: Oh Tom was all right, yes. As I say I have always got on well with Tom Kelly, he is a gentleman’s gentleman.
So you think it was really in response to your request that they came under administration? They actually dismissed the Board didn’t they?
RC: Well I reported that I thought the credit union was becoming unviable and that it should be seriously looked at for administration. Subsequently they went along with that.
They went into the Common Board then?
RC: Yes. Pat Taylor took over and they administered it for a while until it was merged into Metropolitan Credit Union. It was called Central Mutual then, wasn’t it?
Were you involved with Central Mutual at all?
RC: No, not at all.
So where did you go then?
RC: I went out and I was doing some advisory work and consulting work. I went to the Electricity Commission actually and I was doing consulting work there. They were looking for a Manager and I decided I wasn’t going to go into credit unions again. So I was there for many, many months as the Acting Manager while they advertised. I helped them interview and appoint a Manager subsequently. I was there for over twelve months. Then I went to the ABC.
The ABC Credit Union?
RC: Yes. When the Electricity Commission appointed a Manager by work had wound up up there. I was thinking what to do and I hadn’t been real well. Anyhow I talked to Dennis Miller at the ABC and I became the Accountant of the ABC Credit Union for some twelve months, or fifteen months or so, there.
Where did you go next?
RC: From there I gave it away and I went to the Gas Company where I spent nearly twelve years. I have recently retired from there.
Not in the credit union?
RC: No. Nothing to do with the credit union at all. They have a credit union there, one of the oldest credit unions in the League, the Gas Company. I have never been involved in it. I had a pretty busy job at the Gas Company and did quite well.
Well I suppose we had better go through the check list I guess. There was one thing you were involved in, looking from the positive side, and that is AICUM. Were you actually in the discussions that led to the start of AICUM?
RC: This is the Management Association?
What was it called first?
RC: Oh just the Credit Union Managers Association.
CUES that was, wasn’t it?
RC: We didn’t know whether to affiliate with the American CUES and such like. I have been to meetings CUES in Phoenix, Arizona a couple of years ago with my wife. We just got together and much to the objection of some of the Directors of credit unions that the Managers were getting together. We were looked upon with great suspicion that the paid staff were trying to take over the movement from the volunteer staff, who were the true carriers of the faith of the credit union movement, of course, according to some Directors. Anyhow we used to meet and some Managers were actually forbidden to attend the meetings in those days. Some would attend under the disapproval of their Boards but were allowed to go sort of thing. We used to meet there at the Teachers’ Federation building for a year or so down there. It gradually grew from that. We got some guest speakers from the School of Management, University of New South Wales and such like. It gradually became quite a viable organisation where you could learn a lot from each other and discuss our problems. At this particular time, this was in the early 1970s, the credit union movement was just starting to spread along. We were into all the problems of computerisation, which had its own problems and they were huge. It perhaps formed a nucleus to assist other Managers to get off their feet and get things developed. Because on our own, individually, we would never have done it. By the co-operative that we formed I think it was a boomer to the credit union movement to have this association.
Do you remember where you had your first Annual Meeting?
RC: Well I would say that it would have been at the Teachers’ Federation for sure.
So when did the Albury School start? Were you involved then?
RC: I have been to one Albury meeting. I don’t remember the Albury Schools. No that was after I was out of it.
Was the ICUD started from AICUM?
RC: This would all have developed just after I disassociated from direct involvement. This would have been subsequent to 1974.
So do you know any more about the start or the continuation of AICUM?
RC: No. Other people could give you a lot more information like Helen McIntyre and Nerida Matthews and Graham Humphreys and those people. John McIntyre.
I have already interviewed him. I have only got one left and that is Graham Humphreys.
RC: Well those people were directly involved and they will bring you up to date anyhow.
You mentioned computerisation. When you left the League it hadn’t actually computerised?
RC: No. Credit unions were involved with DP&S on the batch system then. Do you remember the DP&S at Crows Nest. Some of the credit unions were trying to develop their own, like Tom Kelly who had always been a loner on that.
Do you remember the start?
RC: Well I think the Electricity Commission was one of the first to go computerised. We put in a mag stripe machine way back in 1968. We used to have to do decimal currency conversion and we got a decimal machine, a NCR 32, on 1 January 1966. We were on decimals before D-Day. In 1968 we acquired a Burroughs 34 Series mag stripe machine, which could read from punch cards and also print ledger cards from a mag stripe on the back of the old system. That was one of the first computerised credit unions I think. Then in America we saw these great computerised systems they had there, the IBM system, like the California League. The first year they lost something like $300,000 in losses from the bureau they set up. The Michigan League had a system which was a phone-in system where credit unions ran their stuff through telephone lines late in the afternoon and they would have a batch running at night. That was also a big foul-up eventually. It was terribly cumbersome. Of course we have this magic system we have here now and the credit unions developed initially by these Western Australians was sort of something magic. It was perhaps the saviour of the movement because we have been floundering around with a number of systems. Credit unions were factionalised, couldn’t agree. DP&S was the one the League was federalising on and was perhaps the best available at the time to keep the ???? but that was still cumbersome and as it was it fell in a heap. There were a lot of problems with balancing and credit unions getting out of kilter with their books and such like. Also inexperienced people were mucking around with them too, of course.
Sydney Credit Union, that’s the City Council, they claimed to be the first financial institution, not only credit union, in Australia to actually go on the computer batch system.
RC: Could be. If they want to claim that well let them have it.
They did it in their first year. They went down to IBM and asked and apparently IBM hadn’t got a program and they asked them to write one, which they did.
RC: I wasn’t aware of that actually. What year was that, did they tell you?
1963.
RC: 1963.
They didn’t get a computer for years though. But they ran this batch system.
RC: I know the Electricity Commission having all their pay-roll and all their pay-roll deductions were run by the IBM 1401. That was in 1964. There was a computer print-out. Part of the deductions were run on the computer for them.
Even the City Council didn’t have a computer. They used to use the Water Board’s. That was apparently Ron Preston who was responsible for running the rating system through the Water Board’s computer.
RC: It was a connection they made up.
It was his idea because he and Dermot had originally went down and had IBM write that program apparently, according to them anyway.
RC: I didn’t know that before.
I believe the League also used that batch system in the first instance. Well not in the first instance, a lot later, or there was talk about using it.
RC: I didn’t know.
That is probably wrong that the League was using it, because as you pointed out they still hadn’t computerised in 1974.
RC: Yes in 1974 we were still using the accounting machines in the old building there. I don’t know if we were doing any DP&S batching at all. I don’t think so. Virtually the League books, well there weren’t any books, but the central banking was by ledger card. There were only a hundred and something credit unions so there was only one hundred and something accounts to keep, so it wasn’t a very large system to maintain as a machine-manual system.
All the mergers that took place in the 1970s, what was your view of them?
RC: Well my view has long been there have been far too many credit unions. I can understand the individuality of them and people wanting to keep their own parochial interests and suit their own purposes. I thought there was always a system where that could be maintained whilst the administration of particular groups of credit unions could be centralised to save costs. I was a great pusher for this, like the Federal government ones. It could have been a very large federal government-industrial credit union with its various branches, so to speak covering the various departments which would be theoretically individual credit unions with local committees who look after the needs of their particular clients. But the administration, the computerisation, the management and all that done centrally, in other words centralising your costs. It is like getting rid of State governments in favour of one Federal government, imagine the huge costs you can save. I can see the same principle applying to credit unions. I thought there were far too many, they were fractionised. What mystified me was that we went to the Newport Schools, we learnt the principles of credit unions, of savings and lending and servicing members and we went back to individual credit unions reported to our Boards and made policies diametrically opposed to each other. Credit unions would come out with amazing opposites to what we had previously learnt. I could never understand why in advertising and such like, why couldn’t we get together. The building societies jumped on the wagon first and got a standardised advertising system, a promotion. Now credit unions were going their own way, willy-nilly, off at all sorts of tangents at tremendous costs. Clarrie Steward, I know, tried to work towards standardising promotional equipment to save money. I thought there were far too many credit unions and I think there still are today too. I know one particular one is operating for the good of the person who is running it. He is virtually living off of it and he is a volunteer Director. In his indifference to the good of the members he is running that credit union, he won’t merge with anybody because it doesn’t suit him.
A lot of people have been the other way though, haven’t they? They have voted for mergers when it is against their own interests or the credit union’s interests.
RC: Well that has happened of course. But I think it is a shame there are a few still holding out. One particular one I have in mind, it is a shame it is being held out of a merger, its obvious merger.
What about the extensions of the bond and the talk about abolition of the bond?
RC: Well I can see that in the initial stages our bond was a law and we struck a chord on this because we said we would lend to each other and we would collect. In effect it meant that people were borrowing from each other. But now I think we have got into a materialistic society and I see it more now that if credit unions are going to have to compete with financial institutions. Particularly building societies who are evolving into virtually credit unions now they are offering exactly the same they have copied everything that credit unions have done. The same as the banks did. I mean you couldn’t get a personal loan from the Commonwealth Bank twenty years ago, today they copy everything credit unions have done. What credit unions had twenty years ago the banks have now. Now the building societies have now developed into virtually credit unions. Unless the credit unions can convert to the same facilities and the same rules of building societies they are going to be at some disadvantage. The first thing is to get rid of the bond, in other words open up to the free market. This presents a problem of where I mentioned before that some credit unions would not be sophisticated enough to act that way because they are too small or they have got the facilities or the trained people to operate it. So you need mergers and larger credit unions to operate it. Then you get the situation where some credit unions can and some can’t do certain things, which is wrong. So there are problems which evolve from all the moves you make. But I think the bond is something that should be gradually worked out of the system if they are to survive in the tough world of the financial institutions operations.
But the bigger they get the less personal they get.
RC: No I don’t believe that. I belong to a very large credit union and I think it is still very personal. Here again they have had staff changes. One particular person I know has recently retired and she ran this department and perhaps now she has gone will she be replaced by someone who grew up with the movement and is as dedicated I don’t know. I know that credit union has always been very personal to its members and it is very, very large. Hundreds of millions of dollars, turning over millions of dollars but it is still very, very personal to its members. You can read that in their newsletters and such like as they come up. They are trying to offer good services. How personal do you want to get, how personal do people want you to get with them these days?
That’s true in that sense. That is one of the reasons why I have never joined a credit union. I don’t want anybody to particularly know my business, thank you very much.
RC: Well they shouldn’t know your business, it should all be confidential. ‘Should’ is the operative word is it?
I would rather deal with an anonymous organisation in these matters than somebody personal, frankly.
RC: I see what you mean. But you can join a credit union quite impersonally. They would never, ever know who you were would they.
Probably yes but I have my doubts now though because I have been round the various credit unions.
RC: Oh you mean yourself would be known personally, I see.
Anyway I am not a credit union sort of person at all. I don’t believe in borrowing money.
RC: No well I have been a member of credit unions for years and I have never borrowed from a credit union. I did once for another person. I do all my business through a credit union, banking, all my business through a credit union. I believe they can provide from the cradle to the grave and I have never borrowed for anything. Being a conservative accountant I’ve always saved up before I spent money, which is perhaps foolish in a way.
What about the various services that the credit unions are now offering on a co-operative basis, do you approve of them?
RC: I do yes. I think the credit union can provide all services as I say from the cradle to the grave. They should be able to provide for all the financial and service needs of a person throughout his life. There is no reason why they can’t.
Do you think they should provide more co-operative services than they do?
RC: Well if they fit within the ambit of a financial, social justice provision.
What about the services that credit unions overseas provide. I mean in America for instance the co-operative housing is a big thing.
RC: Well I am not too sure about those things. I know in Canada they have got service stations, I know in Queensland the communications for one of the postal ones has motels, they have got a property in Noosa and I have stayed there and a motel out near the Technicians School which is a boomer. You have got a Technicians School and next door is a motel where they put them up. The credit union owns the motel. I am not too sure that is the line that credit unions should be into, into that development. Once you start to expand out and out you can lose control. I know in this Queensland one it has started to become more important than the credit union itself. There was more money made out of the Noosa property than there was out of the blinking credit union. Therefore the concentration went on that sort of work and not on the credit union. So I think they should stick more to the savings and lending side, the simplistic side, and the service side, insurances and those sort of things association, rather than get out into these peripherals of running service stations and condominiums.
What about financing such organisations? I mean again in America you have got car pooling as a big thing so they finance car pools. The other thing is time-sharing holidays, that’s a big thing so they finance them.
RC: The financing side is one thing, being directly involved if they are involved in the ownership and such like is another. The financing is business, that is credit union business lending money. If it is done properly and efficiently I can’t see any problem in that. But to be involved in the actual running of the businesses I have some doubts about that unless they find somebody to run it.
That’s a big problem you see, because it is a matter of finding enough people to run the co-operatives efficiently. If a credit union is running a co-operative organisation efficiently they think well they can do the same thing with something else. Well maybe they can and maybe they can’t, I don’t know.
RC: Well we have had a few situations in Australia, not in this State so much but in some of the other States, where the Association has not been as strong or as efficient as New South Wales where they have tried little things, little peripheral things and have had their fingers burnt badly.
Of course America has been very badly burnt with the commercial loans. Canada too.
RC: Well they have started to think because they think big they have thought too big and they have gone off the deep end.
Banks too, of course. They have been very badly burnt.
RC: The State Bank of Victoria is one.
Not only them is it. Are there any areas in the credit union movement at all, particularly with the League, Association, that we haven’t covered that we should have done with you? I don’t know whether you have got anything down this check list in any particular area.
RC: No. We have talked about bonds.
Any area of your involvement that we haven’t covered yet?
RC: No. In my various spheres I just wanted to contribute. As I say I was involved with the Electricity Commission, then with the League. Also I was one of the first to put through a merger of credit unions with the Electricity Commission group going in, the different power station credit unions joining the one. That was one of the first ever done by the League or Association. What did they call it then, it was not called a merger it was called something else?
Transfer of engagements?
RC: Yes, transfer of engagement. I think it was the first that went through. As a matter of fact we made a small mistake in that and it is still going today, that we had to buy them out, give them places on the Board of Directors. That made the Board of Directors rather unwieldy and they are having all sorts of trouble in getting it reduced. I believe they are gradually whittling it down but it has taken from 1969 to today, over twenty years, to get the Board of Directors reduced to a manageable size.
Well the same thing happened here at the Association, the League?
RC: Well they are getting that pulled back to a reasonable size too. Things you do for expediency I suppose.
End Tape 2A: 5298 Words: 2 hours.
20 JUNE 1990: ANSWCU54: RICHARD RAXWORTHY TALKING TO RAY COOPER
Now let’s just clear the last of this up, I suppose. How has the credit union movement influenced your life do you think?
RC: I would say it has perhaps had the greatest influence on my life after my military service, which was a short two years. Coming into the credit union movement, as I mentioned, I became very, very enthusiastic. Even to this day whilst I have been separated directly from it for some years now it is still deep-seated in my roots. If you mention credit unions I will talk for hours on it. It seems to become part of you and I have always been very proud to belong to it. I suppose I would have to say it has had the most dramatic effect on my life.
Who was it who influenced you most in the credit union movement do you think, in the first instance and later on?
RC: I think first of all it was Harry Head, who was the Founding Director of the Electricity Commission Credit Union, subsequently General Manager. Harry was steeped in the great philosophy of the credit union movement. Followed by in the early stages I suppose by Stan Arneil who impressed me, got the message across. Getting to know people like Ken Miller and Dermot Ryan, they were special people. All the people, the guys from the City Council and the County Council, meeting them at the Newport Schools. The Newport Schools I suppose is the focus of as I know the credit union movement as I know it started in my life really at the Newport Schools. You got to know everybody and got to know everything about the credit union.
What do you think struck the chord with you? Do you think it was a religious influence that struck the chord, or was it political, what was it?
RC: No, nothing to do with religion or politics. I think inbuilt in all of us is a bit of a boy scout. We have a need to do good for somebody else. Whether that is a Christian ethic or Islamic ethic I don’t know. It has nothing to do with religion as far as I am concerned. As I mentioned earlier, I was offered a hundred quid to do an audit on the books which I did, but it didn’t take long for me to regard the hundred quid as most unimportant.
I understand what you mean. Do you think your work for the credit union movement has taken a toll on your health or on your family life?
RC: On both, yes it has. It did knock me about. I was working very, very long hours and very hard. Some of it was to no avail. Then my family did break up over I think my travels and getting around a lot. Where the blame lies I suppose is primarily with myself for starting to forget the family a bit so the family broke up. I have to say that my involvement with the credit union movement would have been directly responsible for that. But I am responsible for letting it happen, put it that way.
There is one thing here that hasn’t got anything to do with your personal involvement but do you think the credit union movement should ask governments for changes in credit union regulations at the present moment? Do you think there is anything that should be changed?
RC: Well I am not aware of what the problems really are. I know we have got our tax exemption and that should remain. The bond situation. Some of the restrictive practices in registering rules are a bit of a bug-bear. This nonsense they go through every year at Annual Meetings of passing rules and having the Government approve every little rule change to see there is no conflict and overlapping. This sort of nonsense that the Registrar seems to go on with. I think some of those could be streamlined out. Here again a lot of those problems wouldn’t arise about overlappings if there were fewer credit unions.
What about the matter of showing a profit on every situation? I mean for instance if you are really trying to help anybody in the credit union movement and use Peter to pay Paul shall we say, then it is against the regulations.
RC: Yes well there again I think that is an innocuous situation because running a credit union with many, many services provided to members some of them will cost more than they produce. How can you line up a cost-effective situation on say advertising. You might spend $100,000 on advertising but how do you know what you get back from it. Or a particular service, like an ATM service down at the front counter, it might cost you more than the actual money that goes through it. I think the overall thing has got to support the lot whilst having in mind good prudent business. You watch each operation so that you don’t get out of kilter, but your major profit operations are substantial enough to support the ones that might run at what you call a loss. But they don’t call them a loss, I think they are part of the service.
I am often asking people about the credit union philosophy. Do you reckon that the credit unions have stuck by their philosophy?
RC: I think generally, as I am aware, the philosophy is fairly simply capsulised. It says in our Act it is a method of encouraging savings and encouraging people to make wise loans and to encourage habits of thrift. That is the basic philosophy and from that you can evolve all the commandments you like out of those three tenets.
Do you think the balance of saving and credit is correct at the present moment? Do you think they are encouraging thrift or do you think they are more encouraging credit?
RC: No, I think they are encouraging thrift. In the advertising I see of the credit union that I am associated with, their advertising material that comes out is always pushing the various services available for investment and saving and interest rates. Of course they have to advertise that that money is available for borrowing. Also understand that the credit union that I am associated with that its balance of loan turnover is quite good against its savings and the unit is pretty right. They turn their loans over very quickly against the savings.
So you think that the credit union movement has stuck by its principles, they haven’t gone wrong in any way?
RC: I can’t speak for all of them, but I think generally the movement, the Association has gone a long way and the Reserve Board has done a lot to keep credit unions on the straight and narrow in the main principles. There are always a few who will waver off but I think they are generally in line as far as I am aware. I am not aware of any disasters heading our way.
Is there any way that credit unions could improve, do you think?
RC: Well as I mentioned before, I think that fewer credit unions. If we dispose of the bond situation may open credit unions up to have at least a even running with building societies as we know them now. Or even the banks. The banks and the building societies, which are now banks like the Advance Bank and the straight banks. So that the credit unions, while maintaining the credit union ideals, can operate within those ambits.
Well what is the challenge for the future in the League area? I mean I understand at the present moment there is a move to abolish all the Leagues.
RC: Yes I have only read a little bit on this in the newspapers and the Regional meeting papers. There again I suppose that federation is the big thing, a centralised government, it is cheaper for general administration. Some of the Leagues, other than New South Wales, are so small as to not to warrant to be separate Leagues anyhow. I can understand it would be probably more efficient to centralise AFCUL operations in Australia. Even though our country is very large and vast, I think with the communications as they are now we can operate as a centralised federal system. I am not too sure we need State governments in this country either.
Well I am not so sure we need a Federal one.
RC: That is a good suggestion.
I am only being the Devil’s advocate there. Do you have any memorabilia that you can donate to the project?
RC: Well I can’t really put my hand on anything at the moment. I have a lot of stuff packed away and I did move home some years ago. A lot of stuff is still in the old home and I would have to try and find that. I have slides from the overseas trips to Madison and such like, if they are of any consequence. Most of the other stuff is got is collection stuff like old records of Father Ganey talks which are probably in the Association library anyhow.
Can you do something for me then, can you make a list of what you have and then let Tom Kelly have that at the Australian Credit Union Historical Co-operative. Perhaps by that time they will have their catalogue updated so we can check out what they have got and what they haven’t got.
RC: Well if I can find anything worthwhile among the stuff there.
If you could make a list of that stuff and compare notes with Tom. In the case through Tom as well to Clarrie Murphy, who is handling the films, we could sort out whether there is stuff that might be worthwhile copying or whatever, you know. If you have got any duplicates of the slides, shall we say. We have got quite a few slides.
RC: They are tourist slides virtually. I have a picture inside Madison Colosseum at the Annual Meeting there with Jack Lange and the people there that year in 1970. Pictures outside the old ???? House and the CUNA building.
That’s good. Even pictures of yourself when you were younger you see.
RC: Good looking bloke then.
I have shown you who has been interviewed and the list for the future. Have you got any ideas on who should be interviewed that I haven’t got.
RC: No. I think you have got a very comprehensive list and I am quite impressed with the work you have done and I think it is a tremendous idea, what you are doing. I hope you have great success. It is a shame you can’t get Stan Arneil to say a few words. Clarrie Stewart, I think you would like to get a few words out of Clarrie if he will say something. Ron Swanson I’ve mentioned to you. He is one of the people who may have something to contribute.
I suppose I could have got Stan Arneil because I have got a telephone recorder, but I never put it on unless I get a person’s permission first. You mentioned Ron Swanson, anybody else you can think of?
RC: I think you have covered just about everybody. Your list is very comprehensive. I think the people you have got listed down here will give you a very comprehensive and wide coverage and an in-depth coverage of the credit union history up to date anyhow. You’ve mentioned Maurie Dailey, have you mentioned Jack Bannister?
Well all the City Council. I have done Jack Bannister, four and a half hours of him. I included all the League stuff. Jack Coyne I have done him again over four hours and I covered the League stuff. The only people who refused to cover the League stuff, well there was only one person I think who refused to cover the League stuff and wanted to do it separately was Ken Miller. He is definitely on the list.
RC: If you want an adversary, you know somebody who has been a real knocker in the movement, ????? he would always have something to say. Perhaps a view from the other side. He was against everything. He was against the Stabilisation Fund. He got the Electricity Commission out of the League at one stage for a while. That was a fellow named Keith Baskin. Everyone will know him. He was a very negative person. I’ll tell you how you will most probably know his name, he was a returning officer for the NRMA the election before last. I saw his name in the NRMA Open Road. He was on the Board of the Oatley Credit Union.
They’re Georges River now.
RC: Yes. I think he is something to do with them. I know he lived in Earlwood. He retired some years ago from the Electricity Commission. He was a Director of the Electricity Commission Credit Union. He was a negative person. At Annual Meetings he used to knock everything in the League. So for an alternate point of view he would have something to say anyway. That would be interesting.
Did you ever meet Father Gallagher?
RC: No, I didn’t. I have seen the gentleman but I never met him, like never shaken hands with him.
He is dead now.
RC: He was easing out of the activities when I came into the movement, like in the middle 1960s. He seemed to disappear in the late 1960s as I came into it. ??????? Lake Macquarie Credit Union ???? out of court.
He won all of his court cases. The tax exemption for his own credit unions.
RC: He was quite a bull-fighter.
But he rejected the League too.
RC: He was Antigonish wasn’t he. He believed in the right of the Holy Roman Catholic Church to run credit unions only, I think.
Oh I wouldn’t say that. As a matter of fact all the credit unions that he started are still going. His sister is running them.
RC: Yes I know. We used to hear all the stories about those two. When the Registrar would turn up his sister would lock up the books and go out for the day. She would lock up the office and disappear. They are the stories that used to go around. Probably they are defamatory but not meant that way.
I spoke to her about Dermot you see.
RC: Still alive is she?
Oh yes, still active there. She doesn’t only run that, she runs the whole of the co-operative down there. There is a co-operative housing thing.
RC: Is he still alive?
No he is not. He was retired a long time ago, but he died a couple of years ago. All right, well thank you very much Mr Ray Cooper.
End Tape 2B: 2504 Words: 1 hour 5 minutes.