HIGHLIGHTS: Kohn testifies on Fed as systemic risk regulator

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The following are highlights from the House Financial Services subcommittee hearing on Thursday with Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Donald Kohn testifying on a White House proposal for the Fed to take on a systemic risk regulation role.

KOHN ON FED'S CONSUMER PROTECTION FUNCTION:

"My personal view is that the Federal Reserve is well placed to do a good job in the public interest on consumer regulation. I think the fact that we have various disciplines within the (Fed) system: we have a view of the macroeconomy, the markets, our supervision system -- these are congruent with good consumer regulation. (They) give us a way of balancing issues having to do with consumer regulation ... "

"I would hope that the Congress might think about whether there are ways of strengthening the Federal Reserve's commitment to consumer regulation as an alternative to creating a new regulator."

KOHN ON RELEASING TRANSCRIPTS OF POLICY MEETING:

"I would be very concerned that releasing those transcripts earlier would inhibit debate. I think it is in the public interest that we have an unfettered debate within the open market committee."

"In my view, publishing the transcripts themselves have had a somewhat inhibiting affect on the way the debate is carried out. There are many more prepared statements at open market committee meetings now than there were before the transcripts were published."

"If (policy-makers') remarks were going to be made public very quickly, they would be very worried about what they were going to say, and they would be much more careful about what they were saying, and that is not in the public interest."

KOHN ON SYSTEMIC RISK ROLE WOULDN'T GREATLY INCREASE POWER: