There is also the possible impact of the Asian Crisis.

There is certainly a widespread and increasingly strong view that it is a combination of the Asian Crisis and nervousness about the soundness of the euro which is attracting investors into sterling, because Britain will not be in the first wave.

One of the key issues we discussed was how to strengthen the architecture of the international system in the light of the Asian Crisis.

Mrs. Liddell: G8 leaders were very conscious of the serious impact of the Asian Crisis on the poor and most vulnerable.

I certainly recognise the hon. Gentleman's expertise in these matters, but I think that the Asian Crisis was caused by, as much as anything else, the lack of transparency and accountability in those countries' financial systems.

There is also the Asian Crisis, with its inevitable impact on growth and exports; and the anxieties about the run-up to the euro.

, reflecting fears that the Asian Crisis will have a knock-on effect.

One reason why the American economy has been so strong in the last 10 or 12 years is the stability of interest rates, money supply and much of the value of the dollar - although it has been zig-zagging as a result, for instance, of the Asian Crisis.

My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the fact that trading prospects throughout the world and the impact of the Asian Crisis are in part impinging on manufacturing.

Once the impact of the Asian Crisis has arrived, it will slow down extremely rapidly.

Perhaps more significant, the lessons of that event have enabled the country so far to weather the storm of the Asian Crisis with something to spare.

We are dependent on each other's goods and services - the Asian Crisis has cut United Kingdom exports to Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea and Thailand by between 50 and 60 per cent.

It is everybody's business, not only because we are dependent on trade in goods and services with other countries - the Asian Crisis, for example, cut in one single year UK exports to Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea, Thailand and the Philippines by more than 50 per cent.

However, despite the Asian Crisis, Britain's exports to Europe and the United States continue to grow in both value and volume.

Our trade gap with both our European Union partners and non-EU nations is widening, and it has little to do with the Asian Crisis.

The Asian Crisis has brought home to all of us in the EU the fragility of the new world of globalisation.

The consequence of the Asian Crisis is now being visited on the European and British steel industries.

Most people are behaving as though it is in a robust state, but I think that the full effects of last year's Asian Crisis have not yet worked through the system.

That relates partly to the weakness in world commodity prices, partly to the strength of sterling, and partly to the Asian Crisis.

The combination of El Nino, the collapse of world commodity prices and the reduction in access to international capital markets on the back of the Asian Crisis have caused them problems.

I am sure that my noble friend the Minister will tell me that attitudes are changing in both the Fund and the Bank and that the lessons of the Asian Crisis mean that the IFIs recognise the need to be more sensitive to the impacts of their decisions and the social policy adjustments that need to be made.

At the time of the Asian Crisis, the stabilisation schemes for Indonesia and Thailand required them to make cuts in public expenditure.

They foretold recession during the Asian Crisis, and they were wrong.

Even today, after the Asian Crisis, 200 billion dollars are moving across what we call the third world.

When the Asian Crisis arose, Korean factory workers fought in the factories to defend their jobs as they had nowhere else to go.

There is the weakness of the euro against sterling, the Asian Crisis, falling world commodity prices, globalisation of supply, the increasing strength of the retailer, doctrinaire deregulation, and an increasing urban community demanding cheap food, with a government sympathetic to those demands.

Does he recall that, in 1998, in the teeth of the Asian Crisis, the Opposition forecast recession?

The right hon. and learned Gentleman says how lucky we have been - supposedly - but neglects to mention the Asian Crisis and what we have done in internationalenvironments to stabilise the global economy and to work for continuing stability through the institution of such organisations as the financial stability forum.

There is a serious problem, although I accept that that is related to the Asian Crisis.

However, the Chinese displayed great maturity by resisting calls for devaluation during the Recent Asian Crisis, and subsequent utterances from the Chinese Government suggest that they will continue to take that approach.

As we saw in the Asian Crisis, if developing countries open some of their markets—for instance in financial Services—too quickly without having adequate regulation in place, that can have most unfortunate 991 consequences.

As we saw in the Asian Crisis, if developing countries open some of their markets - for instance in financial services - too quickly without having adequate regulation in place, that can have most unfortunate consequences.

He also accurately read the Asian Crisis, for which he was rightly praised in the House and the City, when so many commentators got it wrong.

I remind him that, in 1999, the independent forecasters about whom he spoke so warmly vastly overestimated the impact of the Asian Crisis; the outturn was that the Treasury forecasts were much closer to what really happened.

Since the Asian Crisis of 1997–98, we have recognised the extent of the risks.

We have had astute stewardship of economic affairs, which has enabled the UK to navigate a treacherous international climate that has included economic shocks such as the Asian Crisis, the Russian collapse and the high-tech bubble, all of which we have come through unscathed, whereas in previous eras we may not have been able to ride such rough waters unscathed.

While in government we have had the Asian Crisis, when Korea nearly went bankrupt; we have had the Russian crisis; we then had the IT crisis, followed by problems at the Stock Exchange; and then the Us downturn spread across Europe and Japan with world trade growth stalling for the first time for decades at zero.

Despite constant challenges and the risks of instability in the world economy over the past five years - those include the Asian Crisis when Korea went bankrupt, the Russian crisis, the IT crisis, the stock exchange crisis, the Us downturn, which spread across Europe and Japan, with world trade stalling for the first time in decades, and the volatility of oil prices - we have outpaced our European competitors in terms of growth.

Instead, they have described the instability in the rest of the world and pointed to global difficulties such as the problem with long-term capital management that arose in 1998, and the Asian Crisis of 2000.

Just as we have had to deal with turbulence after the Asian Crisis, the IT bubble, the Us recession and the trebling of oil prices, so our strong economic framework is designed to continue to maintain stability and growth now and in the future.

As the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, the G20, which was set up after the Asian Crisis, includes China in its membership, and rightly so.

I think that, in this particular set of circumstances, all countries now recognise the importance of change - a change that, if I may say so, we have proposed for nine years, since the Asian Crisis.

The Asian Crisis moved on and the countries involved are in a much better state than at that time, because their currencies were allowed to depreciate.

To return to the hon. Gentleman's earlier point about the Asian Crisis, the Asian countries were strongly advised by the International Monetary Fund not to do what they did in the end.

It was the same when the Asian Crisis hit, and the economies that devalued were the ones that grew again fastest and soonest.