OPEN4ING OF NORVJICH UNION HO[ USE
SYDNEY N. S. W. 2 JULY 1970
Speech by the Prime Minister, Mr. John Gorton
Mr. Ramsay, Distinguished Guests from Overseas, Ladies and Gv-, ntlemen:
I am glad to be here this afternoon to croak out a blessing on this
new building. It is particularly appropriate, I think, considering the way I feel this
afternoon, because if I feel the same way tomorrow afternoon, Sir, you are likely
to get a new policy-holder. They call it Asian flu. I think it is probably a bit of a
reflection on Asia. But whatever it is, you have had it and I have got it.
As you say, Sir, I do seem to be having quite a run of Openings this
week. Tullamarine airport one day I hope you will continue to call it Tullamarine,
and today one new building pointing to the skies and adding significantly to what
is already an exciting skyline in Sydney.
I think that both these occasions remind us of the expansion going on all
around us in Australia today which will, I am sure, continue unabated through the
decade that lies ahead of us.
Now, it is quite right, Mr. Ramsay, that in Melbourne one indicated
that the enterprise one was opening would continue to work for twenty-four hours
a day. And I am not going to take your advice as to Norwich Union employees,
because unless i miss my guess they are so widespread throughout the Mo rld that there
is not one hour of the day whenr some Norwich Union employee is not working
somewhere to write some policy for t: ae betterment Gf hurnariity in general.
Sir, this Company has had an active association with Australia, going
back for more thar. one hundred years and I am happy in the presence of your
London Principals, to acknowledge your company's established place in our highly
competitive insurance industry, to acknowledge its service to its policy-holders,
and to acknowledge its contribution through investment to our national development.
It is a mutual society. It is a society where the profits do not get siphoned off,
but whev~ e those who are policy-holders share in the growth of the enterprise, and
where the country in which it is established shares in the growth of the enterprise,
because as I am sure youi know, Sir, some thirty per cent of investments of funds
made by insurance companies are required by law which some people think is
wrong, but I think is at least convenient, to invest thirty per cenPt of their funds
in what I will call developmental activities so that it can help the building of schools
and roads and hospitals and all the other matters which both State and Commonwealth
Governments seek to bring to the people of this country. ./ 2
So it is not just something which is a busineas, although of course it is
a business, but is something which helps the community in wA~ i. Jch it is established
and & tiSti, r , is saying something of some magnitude because the rapid expansion
of the insurance business in Australia is a very clear reflection of the health and
growth of Australia and is of no small magnitude. I understa:-A that life insurance
investment in Australia now exceeds 000 million arid is increasing at more than
per cent a year and we are delighted that this should be so, we are delighted
that you should be building up your own enterprise in this way, not seeking as
happened some time ago, to take over an Australian life company in the process. I
quote those figures because of the importance which I do attach, and which we do
attach, to insurance funds in Australia because of what I have already spoken of
as the great contributionit makes to investment, to Australia's progress.
Now I do have some statistics here which -may be interesting because I
am told that we are cane of the world's most insurance-minded countries, and that
taking the ratio of premiums to national income as a guide, we rank second with
Canada in all the countries of the world, with America being the leader, and if you
take dollars per head spent on premiums, then we rank, fourth after America, Canada
and Switzerland. For tho) se who are interested in precise figures, which I imagine,
Sir, insurance people are, the exact figures in United States dollars spent per head
are: United States $ 277, Canada $ 150, Switzerland $ 134 and Australia $ 115. As
we grow, as we will in the decade in front of us, I have no doubt that we will be
rated second and that will be good for you and for your policy holders and for us.
I think that the establishment of this building by the Norwich Union shows
the confidence that company has in the future of this nation of Australia. I am certain
that confidence is not misplaced. I am positive that in the decade ahead we will grow,
and grow more rapidly with each passing year. That we will have our problems, as
we do now have our problems, is obvious. We have our problems with our rural
industries caught in a cost-price squeeze, the price being uii-ab: le to be decided by the
producer or by this government. We have diff iculties which are inherent in the
growth of big cities, the rapid growth of great cities, and we have a requirement to
give our young people going out to marry a capacity to buy laild and houses not
without effort because these things have always required effort and always should, but
at least without undue effort, and this is also a problem that is with us now.
But there has never been a country at any stage in the woxk which has
not had problems. We have got them. But the opportunities we have got so far
outweigh them that we will, I believe, in the next decade, be almost a transformed
nation and will., have fully justified Norwich Union's own faith in our future as
exemplified by this building which I now take pleasure in officially declaring open.