As the Greek crisis worsens, so voices are being raised demanding new and more radical approaches. Forget the sticking plaster bail-outs and slice-by-slice austerity packages. The ultimate solution to the eurozone debt crisis is “political union”.

Last week Nout Wellink, the Dutch central bank governor, became the latest senior figure to float this idea, when he argued that the eurozone needs “an institutional set-up that has characteristics of a political union”. According to Mr Wellink, “a European finance ministry would be an important step in the right direction”. Jean-Claude Trichet, the head of the European Central Bank, has also backed the creation of a European finance ministry – which in turn implies a much larger central budget and more decisions on spending and taxation taken in Brussels, rather than in national capitals.

Those who argue that “political union” is the solution to the current crisis seem to believe that Europe’s problem is institutional. Unlike the US, the eurozone does not have the political institutions to back up a common currency. But if Europe was just equipped with a finance ministry or the facility to issue eurozone bonds or to tax citizens directly, everything could be fixed.