>@EIB

Simon Brooks, a former Director in the Macroeconomic Policy and International Finance Directorate of the UK Treasury, has joined the European Investment Bank (EIB) as Vice-President. He has been appointed as the British member of the EIB's Management Committee, to succeed Peter Sedgwick.

As a member of the Management Committee, Simon Brooks becomes part of a team of 9 - the President and 8 Vice-Presidents - who are appointed by the Bank's Board of Governors (the 25 Ministers of Finance of the EU member Countries).

As the Bank's permanent executive board, the Management Committee, under the leadership of the President and the supervision of the Board of Directors, runs the Bank in line with the missions assigned by the Board of Governors. Once appointed, the Vice Presidents are responsible solely to the Bank. Simon Brooks started his career at the National Institute for Economic and Social Research in London. He joined the UK Treasury in 1985 as an Economic Advisor, working initially on macroeconomic analysis of the UK, and subsequently as a member of the Monetary Group on monetary policy, EMU, Maastricht and other monetary issues. In 1992, he became Head of Division, Economic Analysis Group (EA), responsible for analysis and forecasting of the UK economy.

From 1994 until 1998, he was Head of the Regional and Country Analysis team, working on overseas economies and their impacts on the UK, and also on a number of international economic issues such as, for example, globalisation, the implications of ageing, world saving and investment, and capital liberalisation. From 1998 to 2000, he was Head of EU Finance, working on the UK's financial relationship with the EU and on Agenda 2000. He then became Director of Macroeconomics with broad responsibilities, including, for example, UK and world economic forecasts, and fiscal and monetary policy frameworks.

Mr Brooks gained a masters degree in economics from the University of Oxford in 1978, following his undergraduate studies - also at Oxford University - in politics, philosophy and economics.

Mr Brooks took up his post on 1 July. He can be contacted at the Headquarters of the EIB in Luxembourg, where he is now resident.

Founded in 1958 by the Treaty of Rome, the European Investment Bank, the EU's long term financing arm, is the world's leading multilateral development institution in terms of the volume of finaning provided (47.4 billion in 2005). It is also the foremost non-sovereign borrower on the capital markets, raising some EUR 50 billion a year. Its lending operations focus on both modernising the economies of the Member States of the European Union and fostering the development of countries outside the EU.