as well. either diversity should be preserved or lack of competition could lead to high fees for customers. let me focus on three issues today : 1. direct debit scheme ; 2. end - date for migration ; and 3. communication. 1. sepa direct debit scheme needs to move forward so, which are the main problems that the sepa coaches still face today with regard to the sepa direct debit scheme? migration of mandates one is a legal issue. how can we ensure that there are no problems in the migration from the existing mandates to the new sepa direct debit mandates? for creditors, it would be a great burden if customers had to sign new mandates when switching from the national direct debit schemes to the sepa direct debit scheme. some countries have already found answers to this problem ; other countries are still looking for a pragmatic solution. if it were to become necessary to make amendments to national legislation, the transposition of the psd into national law would provide a good opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. national legislators should not miss this opportunity to help the payments business to become more efficient, innovative and truly european. reluctance of users communication needs to be stepped up. this is particularly valid for the sepa direct debit scheme. direct debit users are reluctant. they have heard rumours and are afraid that it will not meet their needs. it is not safe, it is too safe, it is not modern, it is too modern, it is too different or more expensive than previous procedures ; a lot of opinions were voiced before the product was even visible. perhaps, the coaches were too busy defining the training schedule and therefore did not have sufficient time to train the athletes? all users should be made aware that their special needs can be met by means of individual offers from their banks, by transparent additional optional services that are offered by groups of banks or by additional services that can be offered at the level of whole banking communities. you will have noticed that i stressed the word “ transparent ” in connection with additional optional services. transparency is crucial, because we do not want to see fragmentation reintroduced through the back door by additional optional services, the main aim of which is to protect markets and hamper competition. users are also concerned about the prices. if we want the users to embrace the sepa direct debit scheme, it is clear that prices for these services to end - users should not go up. otherwise, we will face a tough challenge

would not last forever. we have not yet discussed the when and how of its termination. but it ’ s understood, of course, that this is the direction in which things are going. what has not been discussed by the governing council, however, is an increase in interest rates. it is very clear to us that short - term interest rates those the ecb controls, will remain at very low levels, well beyond the horizon of our asset purchases. in other words, when reuters says that the teams at the european central bank presented to the governing council a scenario envisaging an increase in the rates in mid - 2019, it ’ s a scenario that you are telling us you are ruling out? this is what the markets are forecasting ; the ecb ’ s teams have bloomberg screens like everybody else. but the governing council has never discussed this. bloomberg or reuters screens … let ’ s respect the competition! anyway, i ’ m looking at the very latest indicators on our economic activity. manufacturing in january was clearly declining in france, two months of slight pressure in germany, with the mid - february pmi data also falling back a bit. aren ’ t we levelling off now? we have finished accelerating and in fact the risk is that growth will fall back … 1 / 5 bis central bankers'speeches no, i don ’ t think that it ’ s worth being frightened by a few indicators. growth is strong. there is a kind of stabilisation of the growth rate, when we talk about what ’ s called the “ second derivative ” rather than growth itself. maybe there ’ s a stabilisation. in a way, that strengthens the belief that there have to be structural measures which will take over from monetary policy. of course, that is the only possible direction. you have described your policy as “ giving time ” to all the governments to attempt reforms. has france now taken the right road, the right direction? yes, but it ’ s not the job of the ecb to give lessons to or to go into detail about what this or that government must do, because we don ’ t do politics, that ’ s not for us. we have a mandate which is very simple, which is to bring inflation in the euro area back towards 2 %. and we ’ re making very good progress towards that, but we ’ re not quite there yet. then, growth drivers are needed, growth in investment, in consumption, to take over from monetary policy