Thread: Gordon Brown's G20 dream fades amid European hostility

From The Times
March 20, 2009

G20 summit: Gordon Brown's G20 dream fades amid European hostility



David Charter in Brussels

Gordon Brown’s hopes of leading the world out of recession at next month’s pivotal summit in London were undermined yesterday when European leaders flatly rejected calls for a further massive stimulus package.

The Prime Minister has been forced to lower expectations for the G20 summit, where leaders of the richest 20 countries will gather. Mr Brown has stopped comparing his event on April 2 to the Bretton Woods meeting in 1944 which set up the postwar world financial system. He recognises that there is no appetite to create new global institutions in the face of reservations in the European Union and the US.

The London meeting risks being overshadowed by a dispute between Europe and the US over public spending. A series of leaders at an EU summit led by Angela Merkel, the Germany Chancellor, refused yesterday to go along with American calls for greater borrowing and spending by Europe.

Amid scaled-down ambitions for the G20 Mr Brown is backing a doubling of resources for the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the lender of last resort to bankrupt governments that Bretton Woods set up. He will push for its reform to involve China and other big developing economies further.

“Some of us have not quite yet implemented our national recovery plans, so we do not know their impact. It does not make sense to introduce new packages.â€

"They will also agree to fight against protectionism."

And that will prove itself the fatal blunder of the countries comprising the European Union.