Kerre McIvor: Time to gas the small change from your wallet

New Zealand has done away with five cent pieces.

It's that time again in Britain. Once again, Treasury has put forward a proposal to do away with 1 and 2 pence coins and once again, members of the public are incandescent with outrage.

Callers to talkback radio, visitors to newspaper websites and writers of letters to editors are overwhelmingly against the idea, seeing it as just another example of the gu'mint ripping off the honest working man and woman.

They fear the cost of living will rise as stores round up their prices and some have said that it's another desecration of Britain's proud history. I understand that the penny has been around since the 8th century but people don't feel parochial about their currencies do they?

The British Treasury says the cost of producing 1 and 2p pieces is going up while the value of the coins is going down. Furthermore, 60 per cent of the 1 and 2p coins are only ever used once.

At the end of each day, people will empty their pockets and tip the brown coins into jars or, particularly among the younger generation, they simply throw them away. As with the rest of the world, Brits are increasingly conducting cashless transactions — in 2006, there were 7.2 billion transactions under £1.

By 2026, Treasury expects that number to fall to just 1.3 billion. So you can understand why the boffins are making a strong case to do away with the copper coins. At the other end of the scale, they also want to get rid of the £50 note; they say it's rarely used for routine purchases and can be implicated in money laundering, tax evasion and other ne'er-do-well activities. Which makes sense too.

I can't recall the last time I saw a $50 or $100 bill — I know Apirana Ngata's on the $50, but I wouldn't have a clue whose face is on the hundy. And who apart from drug dealers or Flash Harrys pulls out wads of cash to pay for their big ticket items? Although wondering what to do with hundreds of dollars in cash is not a problem for me, the small change drives me mad.

I can't stand the silly little coins.

Whenever I'm out and about in Britain and the bill ends in 99p, I will always tell the shopkeeper to keep the change. I'm not sure I'm doing them a favour.

Surveys of retailers show that they're in favour of scrapping the coins too due to the time it takes at the end of each working day to count the little brown coins in the till.

Some critics of the move say the 1 and 2ps are vital for charity fundraising — but I doubt that. In fact, charities could well end up collecting more in their tins as people will put in 5p or 10p pieces instead of the 1s and 2s.

In New Zealand, we did away with our rats and mice denominations in the early 1990s. It was a move that proved so successful that we got rid of 5 cent pieces too. In fact, many countries around the world have seen the sense in doing away with the cents that only serve to weigh down the bags and pockets of consumers.

There's no date set for the UK's coins to be scrapped, but it's a matter of when, not if.

And for those furious Brits who have vowed to take wheelbarrows of coppers into shops to pay for their purchases, as a two pence fingered salute to the gu'mint, they'll need to think again. The penny can't be used as legal tender if used in batches worth more than 20p.

You'd think with the Russian situation that the Brits would have more to worry about than the demise of the penny.

But I suppose pretending that pennies matter takes your mind off your government going head to head with a nuclear power.

• Kerre McIvor's Sunday Sessions is on NewstalkZB today, 9am-noon.