The London Summit is under way at the Excel Centre in East London, bringing together the leaders and finance ministers of the G20 countries, along with the heads of international and regional organisations. The meeting of representatives of the world’s largest economies, accounting for around 85 per cent of global GDP, are finding common ground over the key issues of financial regulation, economic growth, strengthening the global financial architecture and helping the world’s poorest.

Chairing the summit is Gordon Brown, the UK Prime Minister, who said yesterday that the ‘first duty’ of the world leaders gathering in London was to the ordinary people suffering as a result of the global economic crisis and anxious about their jobs, their mortgages and their futures.

‘We are within a few hours, I think, of agreeing a global plan for economic recovery and reform and I think the significance of this is that we are looking at every aspect,’ he said.

The Prime Minister said the first test for the summit would be to agree to strengthened and more transparent supervision of banks, hedge funds and what is known as the global `shadow banking system’.

US President Barack Obama said yesterday how long the crisis would last depended on how effectively countries tackled a series of challenges in the coming months: financial regulation, helping banks deal with toxic assets, managing capital outflows from emerging markets, shielding the poorest countries and reforming international financial institutions.

‘I am absolutely confident that this meeting will reflect enormous consensus about the need to work in concert to deal with these problems.