Bunhill: His Notes

Meanwhile, if you want to know all about the new bogeymen in the Bundesbank, you can read the year's best- timed book, The Bundesbank - The Bank that Rules Europe by David Marsh, out tomorrow.

The book is published by Mandarin, part of Reed, which showed a defiant streak of European co-operation last Thursday by announcing a merger with Elsevier, the Dutch publisher.

In his book, Marsh points out that the Bundesbank has been a reluctant imperialist in its time.

As a senior official, Otmar Issing, put it: 'For a long period we said nothing will come of EMU (economic and monetary union). We have the better monetary policies. Why should we take over a worse currency?' What an unanswerable question.