Grand European
WHO needs the Grand National when we have the European Monetary System? To the professional punter, Brussels at the weekend offered far more attractions than Aintree. A good thing came romping home as a well-backed favourite should — and it could be backed on the happy footing of heads I win, tails I don't lose. A devalua- tion of the French franc against the Ger- man mark (which is what the Brussels reshuffle represents) had looked likely enough for long enough. `Long-awaited', brokers James Capel call it this week. By the end of last year the market had a pointer to its timing: the French elections. After, no doubt, not before: even in France, governments facing the polls do not cut a dash by devaluing. Soon after, so that ministers could deposit on their prede- cessors such blame as they wanted to pass on. All of this had been freely canvassed for months, and it would have been a purblind banker or treasurer who spent those months long of francs or short of marks. He could place his bet, safe in the knowledge that it was covered even if it proved to be wrong. The franc could not soar and the mark could not tumble: they would not be allowed to, under the rules of the European Monetary System. The plea- sure of this for punters is mirrored by its discomfort for bookmakers, who are the central banks. Theirs but to sit and suffer. We can all see the cost of 'intervention prices' in the European Community for everything from butter to beetroot. Now our EMS lobby would like Britain to pay the intervention price for currencies, too. The Prime Minister's will and nerve seem to stand between us and that. I urge her, if she finds those strong qualities finally overborne, to insist that the management of the EMS is put in the hands of the Tote.
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