Financial Markets

Yes, we must. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has argued for the best part of 10 years that we need to ensure that the international institutions—the International Monetary Fund, for example—are reorganised to reflect properly the demands of the early part of the 21st century. They were brought into being at the end of the second world war when world leaders then realised that the IMF would be necessary. However, its role, while still very necessary, needs to adapt, and I think that it can play a greater role in relation to early warnings and greater supervision of problems that arise in the financial system. That is not the only thing that we need to do. We need to ensure that our regulatory bodies co-operate through the colleges of regulators that are now being set up, and other reforms will be necessary as well. We will face considerable difficulties if we do not recognise that in a global economy, a problem that in the past might have been confined to one state or one small part of the world can now spread to the entire world in a matter of weeks. That is why we need that international co-operation, which is so important.