The European Union’s progress toward a multitrillion euro savings and investment union is being hampered by member states defending their own national interests, the bloc’s financial services chief said Thursday evening.

“We are, quote unquote, ‘united in diversity,’” Maria Luis Albuquerque told a Dublin event, invoking the EU’s 25-year-old slogan in response to the pace of progress on an ambitious plan to transform its capital markets. “My appeal now would be focus a bit more on the united and a bit less on the diversity part.”

Earlier this week, the EU’s executive arm announced recommendations for a Savings & Investment Account that would incentivize households to put some of their 10 trillion euros ($11.7 trillion) in savings into other types of investments. The bloc’s financial services commissioner said the announcement was a key landmark in the European Commission’s broader plan to turbo-charge Europe’s capital markets through a range of reforms.

“This is a moment where I think we need to understand that either we succeed together or we fail,” she said.

Asked whether member states were embracing the European spirit demanded by the ambitious project — which aims to finance future needs in areas like defense and pensions — she responded: “I don’t think we’re there yet but I will continue to push.”

The new savings account recommendations included tax incentives, an area that Albuquerque acknowledged is “challenging” to achieve agreement on. Speaking at the same event, Robert Troy, an Irish minister of state with responsibility for finance services, said Ireland would study the proposals and consider creating tax incentives for investments.

Albuquerque said that migrating to other investments from savings accounts would come with a level of risk that policymakers should embrace. “This is not about guaranteed investments, on the contrary this is about helping people understand how and why they should take risk, because without risk there is no return,” she said.

The EU’s savings and investment package also includes proposals for more streamlined supervision of capital markets activity across Europe. One option championed by several countries, including France, is centralizing supervision under the European Securities and Markets Authority, which currently plays more of a policy and coordination role.

“We should have a level playing field,” Albuquerque said. “We should not have people choosing places because one supervisor is better than the other if we are talking about the same rules. I want that single supervisor. How to achieve it is what we will need to debate.”

Harmonizing markets supervision would make a significant contribution to Europe’s broader efforts to simplify its regulatory framework, Albuquerque said, though she cautioned against placing too much stock on the initiatives.  

“I urge everyone to understand, this is not a magic bullet that is going to solve everything,” she said. “Don’t forget that there are many other problems we need to address justifying why we are lagging behind.”