jean - claude trichet : interview with ouest france interview with mr jean - claude trichet, president of the european central bank, and ouest france conducted by mr herve babonneau, published on 11 august 2007. * * * do the current shocks being felt by the world ’ s stock exchanges, arising notably from property difficulties in the us, worry you? i said on thursday 2 august, reporting on the meeting of the governing council, that we would “ continue to pay great attention to the developments in the markets over the period to come ”. this is what we have been doing since then and what we are doing by granting the markets the appropriate liquidity. how is the euro area economy performing? the robust growth we diagnosed several months ago has been confirmed. the international monetary fund has recently revised upwards its growth expectations for the euro area this year, i. e. for 13 countries, one of which is france, and 319 million inhabitants. does that translate into jobs? there are factors you have to bear in mind. we have created in the euro area as a whole more than 12 million jobs in the eight years since the creation of the euro in 1999. in the eight years before that, less than three million jobs were created in the same countries. more than 12 million jobs in eight years. that ’ s more than the united states over the same period. in france, it ’ s the same thing : two million jobs after the euro, 500, 000 before, in the same preceding eight - year period. that ’ s also evident in the unemployment rate … the unemployment rate in the euro area is now at 6. 9 %. it ’ s the lowest we have had for 26 years. the euro has fortunately been accompanied by the creation of more jobs than was the case previously. so the euro doesn ’ t act against employment? those who say that the euro acts against employment don ’ t have the figures to back up what they are saying. i ’ m not saying that it is the euro by itself which has created all these jobs – it ’ s of course the efforts of all our fellow - citizens, the bold, creative spirit of our businesses, the economic reforms which have been carried out, but it ’ s also, clearly, the monetary stability that we have brought to a whole continent, to over 300 million people. what ’ s more, there is a significant consensus worldwide which regards price stability as a necessary condition for sustainable growth and sustainable job

s something we ’ ll have to live with. monetary policy is difficult to understand. and because money creation is something that captures attention and fascinates, expectations of the ecb can also be too high. but there are things that we just can ’ t do. and there are things that we could do, but should not do, because they are political in nature. i ’ m convinced that our narrow price stability mandate has served us very well and has protected us from politicisation. a broad mandate is something that we would not be well equipped to manage, because we are not a political institution. the conclusion is that we will have to safeguard and defend our independence more strongly than we have had to over the last eight years, at ecb level and at the level of national central banks. 3 / 5 bis central bankers'speeches so what would be the right credentials for the next president to have, with those challenges in mind? it ’ s a decision for european leaders and european finance ministers to take. but there are common credentials for any central bank governor. for example, part of the job profile is to understand markets. because, like it or not, we have to understand what markets are telling us. we don ’ t always have to agree. but we have to understand the language they speak. also, you need to understand the political environment – because you have to be able to uphold your independence, and because monetary policy is not the only game in town and in many cases needs supporting action. if you want to see the fiscal response or regulatory response that will help monetary policy, you need the ability to talk to political leaders, respecting our different mandates. and finally, good economics never harm. how do you make the public more aware of what the central bank can and cannot do? first, you need to explain what you ’ re doing, and there are certainly many ways we can do it better. this is an area where central banks can learn from each other. for instance, what the bank of england has been reflecting on in terms of using plain language, trying to resist using arcane, academic language when talking to citizens, is something we could make good use of. it ’ s even more important for the ecb to be active reaching out to people. being a european institution in a tower in frankfurt, we can seem even further away. it ’ s a big challenge. frederic bastiat, the french economist from the 1840s, wrote a wonderful book which