Where have all the ATMs gone? Letters to the editor, July 25, 2026

Saturday, 25 July 2026

Fee-charging ATMs are replacing the bank ones, Mano Manoharan writes. Pictured is one in Naenae.

Disappearing ATMS

New Zealanders had noticed in the last few years that bank branches were disappearing and the few branches open had only a couple of staff to serve customers.

Now the latest is the ATMs, which are being replaced by privately owned NEXT PAYMENT and ALLPOINT machines, which charge you $2.50 for a transaction of your own money. Banks make huge profits from your money by way of interest they get from loans, savings, and mortgages. In 2011, we had over 2400 ATMs, and now it is less than 1100.

The Reserve Bank proposed getting banks to set up more than a thousand new ATM services. But the banks are handing over the ATM to private operators to slash operating costs, shifting customer habits such as digital banking, mobile payment, and physical security to the cash vault as well as the private ATM.

Does this mean banks are owned overseas, and now the local ATMs? Hon Winston Peters said New Zealand will buy back the BNZ bank. What about the ATMs?

Consumer NZ spokeswoman had said it was disappointing that people using non-bank ATMs faced high fees to access their own money. “But having said that, people must have the means to withdraw cash if they need to.”

Even those on benefits will have to pay to withdraw their own money. It is time for the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Cameron Brewer, to look into this.

Mano Manoharan, Hamilton (abridged)

Mark Flyger has found out the cost of a new playground in the CBD’s Hinemoa Park.

Want to share your thoughts? Email editor@waikatotimes.co.nz with your full name and (not for publication) address and phone number. Letters should be no longer than 250 words.

Playground costs

Your recent article trumpeting a new playground for Hinemoa Park omitted one crucial detail - the cost.

According to information obtained under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act, the playground on the Founders Theatre side of the park will cost $1.3 million, with a further $850,000 allocated to the former Boyes Park, now also renamed Hinemoa Park. That is a total of $2.15 million.

Not long ago, part of Rostrevor Street was closed off, painted and decorated with brightly coloured water troughs. Ratepayers are entitled to ask whether the eventual plan is to remove the road altogether and merge the two parks and, if so, at what cost.

At a time when Hamilton City Council faces serious financial pressure, this is yet another example of the blatant disregard of ratepayers by an ‘out-of-control’ profligate fiefdom.

It’s hard for small local authorities to fund big infrastructure without Government help, Hugh Webb writes.

Let’s hope the new Procurement Sub-Committee can arrest this thirst for our ratepayers’ money.

Mark Flyger, Hamilton

Infrastructure puzzle

Under the guise of fostering local democracy, central government keep the responsibility for developing infrastructure at arm’s length. Under the time worn excuse “We have funded them to a greater extent than ever before”, they seek to blame local bodies for any deficiencies brought about by decades of planning deficiencies and underfunding. It offers an alternative to blaming Labour (who have taken their turns at doing the same).

Judge Ema Aitken's conduct during a Winston Peters speech at the Northern Club is being examined by a Judicial Conduct Panel.

It is quite obvious that small local bodies cannot fund major infrastructure development, so the logical solution is for all infrastructure development to be the responsibility of central government. That would include urban as well as state assets.

Private contractors now own most of the construction assets, so that is probably here to stay, but the planning, administration, funding, and oversight of our infrastructure should lie squarely with central government. Who would administer all this? Maybe we could call it the Ministry of Works.

Hugh Webb, Hamilton

Pricey enquiry

Why isn’t the unions’ influence on the left questioned, Trevor Green writes (file photo).

Judge Ema had a few and had a moment she no doubt regrets. Haven't we all? Winston, bless him, took umbrage and now a cohort of cash strapped taxpayers are loaded with a million dollar, and counting, bill. The government keeps telling us there is nothing in the kitty to sort the problems de jour, but somehow, with a simple turn of the spigot there is enough cash to fund an enquiry presided over by people who probably have better and more productive things to do. Nice for some.

Whatever happened to the simple apology. Wake up in the morning, make a sincere apology, public if necessary, have the apology accepted, move on. Cost? A bit of embarrassment but you will get over it. Winston gets his name in the papers and shows that he can be a gentleman, so he should be happy.

As it stands now, Winston and his mob look like a bunch of expensive prats and the enquiry panel would do well to keep their respective heads down before somebody asks how much they are charging for their part in this fiasco.

Geoff Orchard, Ōhaupō (abridged)

Unions and politics

We are now entering 4 months of “silly season” until the elections are over. It is amusing to see accusations from the Left of undue influence that Business has on parties have on the Right. Why is it then that the undue influence that goes to the Left from the Unions not questioned? The unions pay capitation fees of all members to the Labour party but don’t openly tell the member that they can apply to have that stopped for that person.

We know that under Labour rules, the Unions have a very large say, therefore influence, on electorate positions and who is to be the Party Leader.

Now we have the “Greens” saying that they want to make unionism compulsory with the right to opt out, with all onus on the employer to do all the leg work on informing the new employee of their rights, before commencing employment.

Are the unions, that incapable of doing the necessary leg work to attract members that they have to ask politicians to do their recruitment for them? Are unions incapable of standing on their own feet?

If unions were doing good work for those that they represent, then people would be lining up to join up. One must ask why people are not joining unions? I belonged to the NZPFU for 25 years. A union that worked hard for its members those days, when the union executive were active employees as well as a union executive. I believe that today’s union executives are far too removed from the coal face to do members any service, or are they filling in time and opportunity until they can get on the Party list or an Electorate nomination?

Trevor Green, Matamata