It is therefore extremely important that the Commission services charged with conducting macroeconomic and fiscal surveillance for the euro area be sufficiently independent, ideally supported by a body of “wise persons” providing external assessments. We are now at a stage where we need to remain bold and enact those reforms that we envisaged when the crisis was at its deepest.
It was then that we witnessed the clearest manifestation of risks and our judgement was sharpest. It would be a big mistake if, with gradually improving conditions, we fell back into accepting the status quo. I therefore call on all parties to remain as bold in their reforms as they were when we were in the eye of the storm.