The financial services regulator AFM should stick to behind the scenes work and stop meddling in politics, Boele Staal, chairman of the Dutch banking association NVB, says in an interview with Monday’s Financieele Dagblad.

In the interview, Staal accuses AFM chairman Hans Hoogervorst of making ‘inappropriate comments’ about banks and therefore interfering in political decisions.
‘It is cheap,’ Staal told the paper. ‘And it does not help the recovery of a sector which the economy hinges on.’
The AFM and NVB are involved in a dispute about the banking code of conduct which came into effect this January. The AFM says the code should be compulsory, not voluntary.
The AFM has also called for families with children to be given smaller mortgages than single people – a position the NVB was also quick to condemn.
Hoogervorst was a minister for the VVD Liberal party in several governments between 1998 and February 2007.