In the aftermath of the French and Dutch no votes, currency dealers — and some politicians — have been thinking what was previously unthinkable. After throwing in their lot with the euro and handing over decisions on interest rates to the European Central Bank, could some countries decide to return to their national currencies?

On Friday Roberto Maroni, the Italian welfare minister, broke ranks by publicly speculating about the euro’s future. It had proved incapable of dealing with the problems of slow growth and high unemployment, he said.

“Isn’t it perhaps better to return, temporarily at least, to a system of a dual circulation of currencies (the euro and the lira)?” he said in an interview in La Repubblica, the Italian newspaper.

“In Europe there is a virtuous example and it’s Britain, which is growing and developing, maintaining its own currency.”

Maroni is a maverick politician from the Northern League, a junior member of Silvio Berlusconi’s coalition. Other ministers denied that he was speaking for the government.

But the “Italian question” is one that dogged monetary union before the euro came into being. It will continue to do so.

Last week, too, Stern, the German magazine, ran a report of a meeting attended by Hans Eichel, the German finance minister, and Axel Weber, president of the Bundesbank. At the meeting were independent economists, some of whom have warned of a possible euro break-up.

Germany has always been worried about getting into the same monetary bed as Italy, which it sees as a chronically weak economy. Now, according to some, those fears are coming home to roost. Stern’s headline on the report was that the euro is destroying the economy, making it “kaputt”.

Germany, however, is not about to leave the euro. The political establishment is locked in. The question that has concerned the money markets is whether Italy will be forced out.

A report last week from Charles Stanley Sutherlands, a London firm of stockbrokers, said there was a 50% chance of a partial break-up in the euro by 2008 and that the currency would not survive until 2020. Most economists disagree, although previous monetary unions in Europe have all failed.

The European Commission has said that the euro is “for ever”. Otmar Issing, chief economist at the European Central Bank, said any country leaving it would be committing “economic suicide”.

In theory the euro is due to expand. The 10 members who joined the European Union last year are in the “waiting room” and will join when economic conditions are met.

They could be forgiven for dragging their feet. Nobody is in a rush to leave the euro, but it is not a club that anybody is in a hurry to join.

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