MEPs to seek greater say on banking supervision plans

The European Parliament is expected to raise concerns about the eurozone banking-supervisor plan and will push for safeguards to protect the European Union’s single market and make the European Central Bank (ECB) more accountable. 

Of the two regulations proposed by the European Commission in its banking- union plan, the Parliament has a say only in the less important, altering the voting system of the European Banking Authority (EBA). The second regulation – to bestow supervisory powers on the ECB – needs only to be approved, unanimously, by EU member states.

However, since both regulations form part of the same package and must be agreed together, the Parliament’s economic and monetary affairs committee is expected to use its voice on the EBA regulation to get what it wants across the board.

Two MEPs will lead the Parliament’s work: Marianne Thyssen, a Belgian centre-right MEP, will be in charge of the eurozone supervisor dossier; Sven Giegold, a German Green, will take on the EBA dossier.

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Sharon Bowles (pictured), a British Liberal MEP who chairs the economic and monetary affairs committee, told finance ministers at their meeting in Nicosia that she would do all she could to fast-track the draft legislation through the Parliament to help meet the Commission’s target of getting the proposal approved by the end of the year.

Among the measures that MEPs are expected to want to add to the Commission’s proposals is a demand that the ECB by audited by the Parliament. Member-state officials will hold their first meeting on the proposals in Brussels on 27-28 September.