The International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) in Dublin's docklands could do worse than persuade Willie Slattery to take on the role of IFSC "czar" to promote Ireland's financial sector at home and abroad.

He certainly has the pedigree. As senior vice president of State Street, the world's leading provider of financial services to institutional investors, and managing director of State Street's international headquarters in Ireland, Slattery is both senior enough and prominent enough to speak on behalf of the financial services industry. His earlier stint in Deutsche Bank gives him depth of experience. Twenty-two years in the Central Bank of Ireland, where he helped develop the regulatory structure for the IFSC, doesn't hurt his credentials either. And, as anyone who has met him knows, he is not shy about voicing his opinions.

But Slattery isn't interested in the role.

"You'd want someone much more worldly than I for that position," he said demurely. "I have a job I get a huge amount of satisfaction from, so I'm not a candidate. The ideal candidate would have to have a stronger public profile."

Slattery also figured prominently on the shortlist last year for the head of financial regulation at the Central Bank, a position occupied since the beginning of the year by Matthew Elderfield.

But although Slattery will not be drawn on whether he was approached or ever even wanted the job, he is not short of things to say on the subject of regulation, as the issue remains central to the future of his side of the industry, both in Ireland and globally.

He is keen to make two points: first, the domestic banking crisis has been a disaster; second, we should not let our domestic banking problems colour our approach to international finance, which has worked just fine.

"I believe the historical regulatory environment we've had in place as regards the IFSC has been admirable and hugely successful," he said. "It would be wrong to dramatically change the approach to the fantastic businesses across many sectors in the IFSC just arising from the trauma that we've had in our domestic sector. They're clearly separate dynamics and should be looked at separately."

Slattery doesn't flinch from describing the banking crisis in stark terms as "one of the most traumatic experiences in our banking system that any country has ever suffered", but he also feels (as many in his industry do) that Ireland has taken "a measured approach" to reviewing the regulatory environment and should be cautious in pushing the policy reaction too far.

"If we end up with regulation that is not accommodating of legitimate business development in accord with the way the market is evolving, and if we respond to new proposals slowly and are very conservative in our decision making – in case someone accuses us with hindsight of making an incorrect decision – there is no doubt that would have a very negative impact on the IFSC," he said.

It is not uncommon in the IFSC to put distance between the grubby failures of the likes of Anglo Irish Bank and the more elevated concerns of hedge fund administration and re-insurance. Taking that position does conveniently skate over some very high-profile international financial problems that had rather prominent Irish aspects: Sachsen Bank, IKB, Depfa, Bernie Madoff. And people in domestic banking are equally fond of blaming international financial failures for their more local woes.

"What happened in regard to the financial crisis was a systemic liquidity crisis of enormous proportions," Slattery said. "If you have significant activity in financial services, as we do, you will not escape from the waves of whatever global crisis hits the global system you are a part of."

The key for Slattery and the docklands cohort now is retaining competitiveness and government support as the overall economy is buffeted by the blowback from the crisis. Where in the boom years the focus was often on innovation and "moving up the value chain", as the cliché goes, now IFSC firms are paying close attention to the basics – taxes and jobs. That's where Slattery is now trying to make his influence felt, in spite of the credibility problem that financial firms now have.

"Today we have one fantastic thing going for us: we employ 25,000 people [in the IFSC]," he said. "I employ 400 in Kilkenny alone. Do you think it's difficult for me to persuade politicians in Kilkenny that we are contributing to the economy? We have delivered jobs and economic activity. That is our bulwark."

Yet he expresses a lot of concern that those jobs are being undermined by a more punitive personal income tax regime which the government has put in place in the past year to help cope with its ruinous budgetary position. Slattery acknowledges the depth of the problems in the public finances, but is unequivocal that higher personal tax rates – especially on higher earners – have done more harm than good, negatively affecting staff retention at major multinationals and finance companies.

"The personal income tax environment is unfavourable and threatens our competitiveness," he said. "We will not have a successful traded services community relying on what we had 15 to 20 years ago. We are now competing with London, Luxembourg, Amsterdam and Zurich. The take-home pay of someone on €100,000 now is not comparable with those so-called high tax economies. [Tax rises] have had no benefit in revenue collection but have done a lot of damage to the labour environment."

As for the non-tax aspects of competitiveness, Slattery believes Ireland has regained the edge it had in the 1990s at the margins where new business activity is measured, even though salaries and costs are by no means low.

"Growth in the Irish cost environment has made other types of export activity leave the country," he said. "That indicates the relative added value of fund administration. There is a misconception about that activity, that it's low value and back-office. That's rubbish, frankly. It's self-evident you wouldn't be able to have a competitive platform in Ireland at our salaries if it didn't add value."

Still, Dublin and the IFSC have been dropping down the ranks in competitiveness surveys since last year. By December the IFSC had dropped from 10 to 23 in the Global Financial Centres Index ranking of top financial capitals worldwide. But Slattery thinks these opinion polls are fickle and do not reflect concrete, long-term factors as much as they reflect the kind of headlines the country is making.

"Today, I would say, because we had a very good budget among opinion-makers internationally, opinion on Ireland is very favourable," he said. "We shouldn't be complacent because we're the poster boys in February because you might be the bad guys again in April."

Curriculum Vitae

Willie Slattery

Age: 54

Job history: Central Bank of Ireland, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Morgan Grenfell, Deutsche International (Ireland)

Family: Married to Mary. Three kids, Sinead, Niamh and William

Education: BComm UCD

Hobbies: Watching rugby, GAA, soccer, horse racing and playing golf