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European Financial Services Proposals

My hon. Friend knows that I have the gravest concerns about all this. Does he appreciate that although the trade associations—I mentioned the Association of British Insurers, the British Bankers Association and the Investment Management Association —have effectively endorsed the idea of this supranational authority, there is also a political dimension, because whereas they may have a multinational view about these matters in the global context, in terms of the City of London a political judgment has to be struck? That is why I personally take the view that we ought to resist this all the way down the line. As my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Field) said, people in the trade associations take a globalised view based on multinationalism, whereas when one deals with people in individual firms on the ground, one finds that they frequently take a very different view. Does my hon. Friend have any comment to make on that?