Important because of the scale of the challenge to restore stability and create sustainable growth and jobs. Important also because of the role of the Committee in ensuring democratic participation and accountability on EU issues. The euro area has been battered by the fall-out from the great financial crisis that broke out in 2007.
When the flood of financial globalisation receded, it exposed interrelated banking and fiscal and competitiveness weaknesses in many euro area countries. Cross-border banking claims threatened to transmit weakness from stressed countries such as Greece, Portugal and Ireland, to banks elsewhere in the monetary union. High indebtedness of some countries no longer seemed as easily supportable as had previously appeared.