The European Central Bank (ECB) is willing to play a role in the new supervisory authority to be set up for eurozone banks and is acknowledging that more democratic scrutiny needs to be put in place for these new powers.

Right at the bottom of the 36-storey skyscraper known as the ‘Eurotower’ is a little park full of dusty tents and fading banners denouncing capitalism and bankers.

The remnants of the Occupy Frankfurt movement – which in its glory days gathered tens of thousands on the streets of Germany’s financial capital – are almost all gone.

Regina, a web designer who is part of the movement but did not want to reveal her last name, told this website that roughly 50 people still camp in front of the ECB but have little knowledge of what decisions are taken inside.

If she were to deliver them a message, she said, it would be to “keep their hands off our democracy.”

And on Thursday (5 July), nine months since the “occupiers” set up camp at the bottom of the skyscraper, ECB supremo Mario Draghi acknowledged exactly that in his regular monthly press conference.

With the extra supervisory powers soon to be entrusted to the ECB – a German precondition for any direct bailouts from the eurozone fund to struggling banks – Draghi said that particularly since they are a “non-elected institution,” “the new tasks will imply a higher level of democratic accoutability.”