Brown calls for co-ordinated action to tackle financial crisis

Brown calls for co-ordinated action to tackle financial crisis

Brown calls for co-ordinated action to tackle financial crisis

Prime minister Gordon Brown has called for coordinated international action to tackle the current financial crisis.

Speaking in Versailles alongside French president Nicolas Sarkozy, Mr Brown said lessons needed to be learned from the financial downturn and reforms needed to be made immediately “so people have confidence in the financial sector”.

He said he wanted to ensure that banks started lending again and both he and Mr Sarkozy wanted to reform the international financial sector.

Mr Brown called for early warning systems, crisis prevention measures and coordinated international action.

In the future it must be ensured that the “global economy is properly supervised”, he said, describing the current financial crisis as a “defining moment on how countries can work together”.

Mr Sarkozy called for Europe to adopt common positions to tackle the “historic, unprecedented crisis”.

He praised the action of Mr Brown during the last few weeks, describing his planned reforms of financial governance as “fascinating”.

World leaders are due to meet in Washington on November 15th to discuss the financial crisis.