Downing Street Says » International Monetary Fund

» Wednesday, December 14, 2011

International Monetary Fund

Asked about reports of 50 billion Euros being given from countries outside the Eurozone to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the PMS said no decisions had been made and that nothing had changed since the G20 summit in Cannes. We wanted the IMF to be properly resourced so that it could deal with all the problems in the global economy, but we had not made any commitment to increase resources. The PMS said the Prime Minister spoke about this in his statement to Parliament on Monday, when he was very clear about our position.

Asked if the UK would be asked to increase resources to the IMF, the PMS said the Eurozone countries had issued a statement at the end of last week which referred to 200 billion Euros which had spoken about the Eurozone and other countries; but we were very clear that we had not changed our position on this. Put to the PMS that the IMF’s own magazine said that there would be a contribution of 50 billion from the UK, the PMS said the Prime Minister was very clear at the European Council and in the House on Monday; we had made no commitment to contribute.

Asked if the IMF was labouring under a delusion, the PMS said the UK had not signed up to the statement issued by the Eurozone countries late last week. The PMS said we needed to make sure that the IMF was properly resourced, but the message from the G20 was that before that could happen the Eurozone countries needed to do more to deal with the debt crisis. The PMS added that the UK believed the IMF should fulfil its traditional role which was to support countries, not currencies.

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