We also see wages continuing to increase in the future. Now, you really asked me specifically the question of whether corporations and labour – and I'm using that term in a generic, comprehensive way – will find the terms under which they don't contribute to fuelling even more inflation that would call on us to take harder monetary policy measures. This is the assumption that we make. I think economically it is justifiable, it is rational, but of course humans are humans. It's going to be for the parties around the table to actually determine what they do going forward in terms of allocating profits and organising these social relationships. What they can be certain of in their discussion is that the European Central Bank will take all  8/10  BIS - Central bankers' speeches  necessary measures to return inflation to 2%. That, they can count on, and we are confident that we will get there so I hope it helps in their deliberation going forward. The persistency of inflation, as I said, has a lot to do with this unit labour cost that I have mentioned earlier on. This is really the strong – I don't want to use sticky component, because it is going to be persistent, and we know it. Numbers will continue to be high in the months to come, by the way, because we believe that services are going to continue to grow strongly. Labour-intensive services will. Contact-intensive services will continue to grow strongly.
If the uneven pace of economic recovery in the euro area is confirmed and if we see a risk of inflation being too low for too long, we can take action in June. We can act in various ways, depending on the situation. At present, however, it is too early to say what exactly we’re going to do. A lot depends on the forthcoming economic data and on our staff growth and inflation projections, which are to be released in June. Your room for manoeuvre is limited as interest rates are already very low: the key rate is only 0.25%. They are low but they can still go lower. Are negative interest rates in the euro area possible? Negative rates are one of the instruments available to us. They have been discussed extensively by the Governing Council. We are technically and legally prepared for such a possibility. And market participants are well aware that we are contemplating such a move. Wouldn’t negative rates discourage people from keeping their money in banks? This depends on how negative they would be. Indeed, rates that fall deep into negative territory could have an impact on depositors. But a deposit rate slightly below zero does not necessarily imply that depositors would be affected, while still providing incentives for banks to lend more. In recent years, the ECB has used a number of non-standard monetary policy tools. It has purchased bonds on the market, pumped hundreds of billions of euro into the market in the form of cheap loans for banks.