INTERVIEW-Euro's godfather says bloc needs budget surpluses

* 3 percent/GDP deficit policy not helping, surpluses needed

* Greece, not the euro zone, in crisis

* No one will leave the club, lessons must be learned

By Martin Santa

BRATISLAVA, March 10 (Reuters) - The euro zone should reform its fiscal framework allowing budget gaps and run surpluses to avoid debt problems in the future, the euro's godfather Robert Mundell said.

The Nobel Prize-winning economist, whose thinking on currency zones contributed to the creation of the euro, said Greece should serve as a lesson that the framework for fiscal policies needs to be tougher than the EU's current rules.

The Stability and Growth Pact, a European Union rule book stipulating states must keep their budget deficits below three percent of gross domestic product (GDP), is not enough to prevent another debt crisis in the future, Mundell said.

"I think they have to get away from the idea every country has permission to have 3 percent of GDP budget deficit, that has become sort of the minimum everybody moves toward that," Mundell told Reuters in an interview late on Tuesday.

"They can say 3 percent is alright. Three percent is not alright, they should have surpluses," he said, proposing a surplus of one percent every year as an option aimed to put cash aside for scenarios when governments need to cut down debts.

Mundell said he was optimistic about Athens fixing its budget problems, but added he saw scope for it to get financial aid if needed from Brussels -- though he did not elaborate on how this might be done. Greece's partners have stopped short of any such offer while expressing solidarity with Athens, and Germany has led the way in urging it to remedy its own shortcomings.

"As long as they (Greece) keep up the process, and the pressure of their debt is still there, that could be relieved by a long-term loan," Mundell said, adding that short-term loans could also be considered.

Greece is the first country in 11 years of the euro area history to require a political pledge of support as fears over its debt sparked a market attack that dented the euro and lifted Greek bond yields, making debt servicing even more challenging.

"I don't call it a euro crisis, I think it is an issue of Greek fiscal policy," Mundell said.

"If California got into difficulties, or was on the verge of bankruptcy, it's not a dollar crisis, it's California's fiscal crisis."

Mundell, who has been professor of economics at Columbia University in New York, said however that the euro area would get into trouble if a bigger member like Italy were to follow the Greek path.

"If Italy got into big difficulties that would be a problem for the euro zone, because it's five times bigger than Greece and its debt is also five times bigger, or more. That's why it is very urgent that countries use the Greek example to shore up their fiscal systems," he said. (Editing by Stephen Nisbet)