Eurozone needs budget tsar - Finnish minister

BRUSSELS, Sept 26 (Reuters) - The eurozone needs deeper economic integration -- including a budget tsar -- to police national economic policies and avoid financial crises in the future, Finland's Minister for Europe said on Monday.

"Tough rules mean deeper integration," Alex Stubb told Reuters. "That means that finance ministers are not the bosses in town."

Stubb's comments added to recent calls for the euro zone to fix its debt problems by means of "more Europe" -- that is, tighter integration that would curtail the freedom of national governments to manage their own economies.

The remarks came after a weekend in which European leaders in Washington came under pressure from the United States and others to stop the Greek debt crisis engulfing bigger euro zone states.

Stubb said the immediate priority was to "ring-fence" Greece to ensure that worries over its public debt -- which many economists see as unsustainable -- do not destroy confidence in other European countries with large debts.

"Everyone already knows that it's substantially different," he said, referring to Greece. "The real economies of a lot of countries are being hit by the financial crisis."

Beyond the immediate crisis, Europe needed changes on the basis of the so-called "six pack" of rules agreed by the EU earlier in September. These will make it easier for the EU to sanction countries that break its debt rules -- such as keeping budget deficits below 3 percent of GDP.

Finland -- whose voters are balking at paying up to help other European nations -- has said it will only provide new loans to Greece if it can obtain collateral in exchange.