The head of the European Central Bank Jean-Claude Trichet on Tuesday called on Italy and Spain to hasten their return to “normal” budgetary situations and on leaders of the wider eurozone to speed up implementation of a three-week-old plan to tackle debt.

Speaking to France’s Europe 1 radio Trichet said the ECB, which this week began buying up Spanish and Italian government bonds to counter those countries’ spiralling borrowing costs, had asked Italy “in a very clear way these past few days” to take action on its budget deficit.

“We asked the Spanish government the same thing,” he said.

As leading European markets resumed their downward trajectory after a brief rally at the start of trading Tuesday, Trichet said the ECB had also asked European governments to “accelerate the very important decisions they took on July 21.”

“We asked them to confirm that there is indeed a financial stabilisation fund that will be able to intervene on secondary markets as quickly as possible,” Trichet said.

Trichet was referring to the European Financial Stability Facility. Germany and the Netherlands are resisting calls by the European Commission for the rescue fund to be increased from its current level of 440 billion euros ($A617.72 billion).

“What we have to do is restore confidence,” Trichet said.

DPA