UK's Osborne says G7 vows to tackle bank reform with urgency

Group of Seven finance officials agreed on Saturday to press on with measures to deal with failing banks that do not land taxpayers with the bill, British finance minister George Osborne said.

Osborne said the finance ministers and central bankers meeting outside London also reaffirmed that fiscal and monetary policy should be aimed at domestic concerns, not currency manipulation.

"We will not target exchange rates," he told reporters after hosting a two-day meeting of G7 finance ministers and central bankers in a stately home 40 miles outside London.

Osborne said Saturday's talks were mainly focused on unfinished banking reforms, five years after the financial crisis first bit.

"It is important to complete swiftly our work to ensure that no banks are too big to fail," he said. "We must put regimes in place ... to deal with failing banks and to protect taxpayers and to do so in a globally consistent manner."

He added that there was less disagreement about whether governments should focus on debt-cutting or growth-boosting measures than is commonly assumed.

"Everyone is clear that there needs to be credible medium-term fiscal consolidation ... We also agreed that there needs to be flexibility," he said.

(Reporting by William Schomberg. Writing by Mike Peacock)