At first sight, there is no obvious reason why anyone in financial services should care about the European Union's constitutional convention. That would be a mistake. This body of 105 ministers and members of the European and national parliaments under the chairmanship of Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, the former French president, may yet put a lot of City of London bankers on the Eurostar to and from Paris.
The convention is meant to propose a new, simpler and more democratic set of EU procedures. These revised draft treaties would then go to the member states meeting in the usual inter-governmental convention (IGC). If the IGC â slated for later this year under the Italian presidency, so that there can be a new Treaty of Rome â agrees, then each national parliament has to ratify the EU's new treaty basis.
