EU leaders clash on fiscal powers as Greeks protest

"It would involve countries handing over to an unelected appointed figures the right to veto their budgets, so in terms of the implications for democratic accountability it's certainly very radical," said Simon Tilford, chief economist at the Centre for European Reform in London."The German assumption is that countries are missing their fiscal target because they're not trying hard enough," said Tilford. "That sort of misses the underlying reason why governments are struggling to reduce their deficits, which is that tax revenue is falling – in some cases very sharply. Tightening or cutting public spending more when tax revenue is already falling because of weak demand is only going to make things worse."