President Higgins in Strasbourg - An argument for a debt forum

SPEAKING to the Council of Europe in Strasbourg yesterday President Michael D Higgins touched on many issues but none more pertinent than how sovereign states regain control of the economic forces that shape our lives.

Describing this as one of the great challenges for modern democracies Mr Higgins argued that “parliaments, both at national and European level, must urgently claim back competence and legitimacy on economic and fiscal matters”.

The years since 2007 have underlined how powerless much of national financial regulation is. The people of Europe, especially Greece, may be about to discover how feeble a national government is in the face of all- powerful financial forces.