*EU ministers discuss 2011 date for fiscal consolidation
*Urged to consider bank support withdrawal options
*Follows euro zone accord on 2011 target date
By Jan Strupczewski and James Mackenzie
BRUSSELS, Nov 10 (Reuters) - European Union finance ministers discussed target dates on Tuesday for fiscal consolidation and a phaseout of government guarantees of bank liabilities as the region's economy emerges from recession.
Ministers from the 16 countries using the euro agreed on Monday to 2011 as the year to start efforts to reduce bloated deficits, a target ministers from the rest of the 27-country EU were expected to sign up to at talks on Tuesday.
The EU ministers were also asked to consider proposals by the European Commission that they consider rolling back state guarantees on bank debts from mid-2010, or at least charging higher fees for such protection.
European Economic Affairs Commissioner Joaquin Almunia was careful to make clear nothing would be decided abruptly as far as bank support was concerned.
"We will discuss this morning how to start a definition for the exit strategy for the financial support," Almunia told reporters. "These are open discussions and will not reach a conclusion."
Almunia was primarily referring to the blanket guarantees that governments across Europe offered banks at the height of the financial crisis to stabilise the situation and Commission proposals that governments now start to think about how that protection should be withdrawn in an orderly fashion.
The Commission is urging EU capitals to consider the idea of rolling back of such guarantees as economic recovery takes a firmer hold, or at least exacting a higher fee for such protection.
It cites mid-2010 as the possible starting point, though a document summing up preparatory discussions among government representatives ahead of Tuesday's debate keeps all options open.
SLOW LANE PRE-EXIT
What the Commission and governments are essentially trying to do convey to financial markets that they are planning for when they can take the economy back off life support after the worst downturn since World War Two.
The economy is widely believed to have started growing in the third quarter, after five quarters of contraction, because of ultra-low interest rates, heavy government spending and other extraordinary fiscal and monetary measures. The euro zone's combined deficit is forecast to surge from 2.0 percent of GDP in 2008 to 6.4 percent in 2009 and 6.9 percent in 2010 because of those measures and lost tax income, with a similar rise at EU level, according to Commission forecasts.
The euro zone ministers agreed that budget consolidation should start in 2011 and in some cases even sooner and the Commission is due to publish recommendations on Wednesday on the pace that various countries should target.
A document obtained by Reuters showed the Commission wants Germany, France and Spain to cut public deficits by 0.5, 1.25 and 1.75 percentage points of gross domestic product each year respectively up to 2013.
The process would start in 2011 for Germany and France, and a year earlier for Spain, it said.
The Brussels meetings followed a weekend gathering in Scotland where ministers of the G20, comprising the world's largest developed and developing economies, said it was too early to deprive the economy of the ultra-low interest rates and trillions of taxpayer dollars thrown at fighting the downturn.
(additional reporting by Paul Carrel)
(Writing by Brian Love; Editing by Victoria Main)