I think there is no doubt at all that the large multinational companies play a major part in this, but it is also only realistic and right to recognise, as I said a few moments ago, that those responsible for large funds naturally use all legitimate means available to them to safeguard the value of the assets in their trust. I think it right to recognise that, but I agree with the hon. Member. I think he is right in saying that the funds of many large multinational companies play a significant part in this.

So much for a brief chronicle of the events up to Friday, 9th February. What, in fact, was at issue? In the last days of that week the international community was confronted with problems in world monetary relationships comparable in scale with those of 1971, which, the House will recall, took four months to resolve, and comparable also in momentum with those of the five days last June which precipitated the decision to float the pound.

Essentially, the situation confronting us had two ingredients. First there was the persistent weakness of the United States dollar, and secondly, there was the large and continuing surplus in the Japanese balance of payments. That surplus was the counterpart of much of the huge United States current account deficit in 1972 to which I have referred.

The difficulties to which those two factors gave rise developed with remarkable speed and on an unprecedented scale. But it is also noteworthy that there has been no precedent for the speed of the co-operative effort with which new arrangements for the main currencies concerned were achieved. The House will recall that a solution was found to this critical situation at the cost of only one full day's interruption of international transactions. The foreign exchange markets were closed on Monday, 12th February, but within only a day or two most of them were able to open again for business.

Naturally, this speedy action meant an intensive programme of international negotiations. I think the pattern of negotiations which took place is now fairly well known. Monsieur Giscard d'Estaing, the French Finance Minister, Herr Schmidt, the German Finance Minister, and I met in Paris on the even- ing of 9th February. That meeting took place at the request of Herr Schmidt. We met together to consider whether, in the absence of action by countries outside the EEC, it would be possible to establish agreement, before the exchange markets opened again, on effective measures on an EEC basis such as an extension of the two-tier system or the initiation of a joint EEC float.

It is important to remember that at that stage we did not know whether the United States had some specific proposals to make, although it was, of course, known that Mr. Paul Volcker, United States Under-Secretary of Monetary Affairs, had just arrived in Bonn from Tokyo. He saw Herr Schmidt in Bonn on 10th February and then came to London that same evening. That evening he discussed a number of possible courses of action with me in the greatest confidence, including a proposition which was very close to that which was in fact subsequently adopted.

The following morning Mr. Volcker went on to Paris and to Rome and he returned to Paris that evening, 11th February. On that evening I went to a second meeting in Paris, at which Signor Malagodi, the Italian Finance Minister, was present, as well as Monsieur Giscard d'Estaing and also Herr Schmidt. At the end of the evening we invited Mr. Volcker to join us, and after further discussion he told us that he would be reporting to the President on the results of the conversations he had had.

As a result of this series of consultations, we were able to reach an agreed view on the most appropriate action. I only regret that because of the extreme urgency of the matter and also the practical difficulties, which I think will be self-evident to hon. and right hon. Gentlemen, the consultation had to be limited. But it should be remembered that in 1971, when we were also faced with a dollar crisis, following the American measures of 15th August of that year, the series of major international meetings did not reach a solution until December and the exchange markets were substantially upset for the whole of that period from August to December.