Brussels, 21/03/2011 (Agence Europe) - At a meeting on currencies at the European Parliament's economic and monetary affairs committee on Monday 21 March, the president of the European Central Bank (ECB), Jean-Claude Trichet, said the ECB did not back eurobonds in the current situation. Eurobonds would be issued jointly by the eurozone countries to cut the lending costs for the countries involved and relieve them of pressure from the money markets but would reduce the incentive to apply cautious budgetary policies and rein in public spending. Trichet said that eurobonds should not exist until there is a federal budget at EU level. The ECB says that the agreement in principle by the Council of Ministers on the economic governance legislation does not go far enough, particularly over penalties (see EUROPE 10337). Trichet hoped the pact for the euro would become an EU pact governed by EU rules as soon as possible and called for a bank tax to ensure banks paid some of the cost of bailing them out and the cost of the financial crisis in general. (M.B./transl.fl)