Berlin poised to fall into line on stability pact

After four years of breaching the European budget rules it invented, Germany has returned to the path of fiscal parsimony. Peer Steinbrück, the German finance minister, said 5 September 2006 that the German budget deficit would fall to 2.8 per cent of gross domestic product in 2006, below the 3 per cent limit allowed by the European Union's stability pact.