Ministers van Financiën EU verdeeld over implementatie hervormingen financiëel systeem (en)
An informal meeting of EU economy and finance ministers in Prague over the weekend highlighted divisions in the bloc when it comes to implementing some of the reforms of the global financial system agreed just days before at the G20 i summit in London.
The 27 ministers on Saturday (4 April) reiterated the need to press ahead with recommendations made by a high-level EU panel headed by former International Monetary Fund chief Jacques de La Rosiere calling for a new financial watchdog to prevent future financial crises, which would be chaired by the European Central Bank.
But some countries, notably Britain, expressed reservations about how far this joint oversight should go.
"The ECB clearly has an important role to play in strengthening and enhancing macro-prudential supervision, but the precise role has yet to be determined," UK financial services secretary Paul Myners was reported as saying by Bloomberg.
French finance minister Christine Lagarde explained that Britain – which is not among the 16 EU states using the euro – was especially concerned about the ECB being in charge.
"We have to find a joint solution because we can't leave London out of the system. London's role in finance is too big," she was reported by AFP as saying.
ECB chief Jean-Claude Trichet also tried to reassure the British, stressing that all EU central banks would still have a place within the new financial watchdog.
"I insisted on the need to be clear about the fact that the new risk council would not only be the eurosystem but the system of all the European central banks ... including those that are not members of the eurozone," Mr Trichet said.
British premier Gordon Brown is to meet Bank of England Governor Mervyn King on Monday in order to discuss how the country should implement the new financial rules laid out by the G20 leaders.
"The British have a somewhat different view," Dutch state secretary of finance Jan Kees de Jager i said in Prague.
"We hope that in the next couple of weeks these hesitations will be overcome," he added.
Luxembourg, Belgium unhappy with OECD list
Meanwhile, EU countries that the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) last week included on a "grey" list of countries that have agreed to better implement international banking transparency standards, but have not yet done so, expressed their dissatisfaction with the move on Friday.
"I think that the treatment given to some countries is a bit incomprehensible," Luxembourg prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker said.
"We will negotiate double-taxation agreements. When we do that we will disappear from this list," he added.
For his part, Belgian finance minister Didier Reynders said that it was not "very pleasant to be on a list that also included tax havens." He also suggested Belgium could soon be taken from the list after it signs agreements on financial information exchange with a number of countries.
During their meeting last week, G20 leaders vowed to crack down on tax havens and bank secrecy.
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