Banks win - but it should still be payback time if the politicians have courage and are on the side of the consumer.

We now have to rely on the OFT declaring them to have been Unfair in any event, which I suspect they will (no more predictions here).

Then we have to rely on the government to act to force the banks still to refund the charges if they were determined to be unfair by an independent OFT. The ball would then be in Gordon Brown's court.

His responses at PMQs today were not very promising, concentrating on empowering the consumer effectively for the future and not in respect of the past.

It seems, though, that the government wants simply to sort things out "Going Forward" according to a treasury minister responding to the decision today. That is simply inadequate and cowardly. The government should stand behind the consumer. It's already spent too much time standing behind the banks.

I believe that the public clearly had no adequate protection by the law from a predatory cartel which operated at the heart of our financial system - the British Banks. Working together in a system which was so inadequate that that it failed, leading to imminent bankruptcy for the banks (probably for all of them would have gone bankrupt without taxpayer support of the entire system).

One has to start to wonder whether it was worth saving the sorry assets of these immoral commercial entities in the first place. That is the subject of another blog to come.

The consumer had no choice as to whether to choose a bank with other terms and conditions, there was no competition, and consequently the inclusion of these terms was part of an unfair bargain where a number of Big Businesses ganged up against the consumer as a whole. I think that constituted an oligopoly amounting to a cartel which was bad for the free market, bad for the consumer and bad for business.

No-one would have freely entered into negotiations with their bank which would have included the terms (which changed monthly) which they relied upon to raid the bank accounts on a daily basis of consumers and businesses at an unfair and extortionate level, especially in the early days.

That all of the other banks included similar terms made such negotiation impossible in any event. The OFT has now to determine (and quickly) that there was no free negotiation available, the deal was unfair, the level was unfair and the actions of deducting the amounts was unfair. They now need to decide this in no uncertain terms - I believe that is what the Supreme Court decision is effectively implying should now be done. Effectively the Supreme Court Justices passed the buck to the OFT and, quite rightly, thence to the government.

The OFT should have appealed the penalty charges decision by the Appeal Court so that at least there were two lines of legal attack. I believe that, if they are not out of time, they should appeal that decision to the Supreme Court now, and if necessary today's decision should be appealed to Europe.

Their failure to act appropriately in this regard has shown the OFT to be toothless and incompetent. It will rather pathetically also be shown to be utterly toothless amd useless if it comes out to say in the next month that the charges were unfair; but, don't worry, no-one can do anything about it; the banks just have to be good in the future.

The government should order each of the banks in which it holds shares to refund the charges in any event, if the OFT rules they were unfair charges. Judiciary justice has failed, now political justice will have to come into play. Will David Cameron take the cue and stand for consumers if Gordon Brown does not?

The Bankers' association representative said today, as I predicted, that the needs of the majority of bank consumers "who've managed to keep their affairs in good order" need to be taken into account and 'that this is a competitive market'. This really takes the biscuit. This, from the banks who would have no financial assets to keep in good order if the taxpayer had not stepped in to bail them out of bankruptcy! The banks were utterly incapable of keeping their affairs in good order.

If the government-controlled banks refund the charges in full (and it would be a good way of getting liquidity into the economy that the banks have thus far failed to do - just ask small businesses) then if the others don't....well, it's a competitive market! If the banks want a compettive market then perhaps all government support should now be withdrawn from banks. Especially those who refuse to refund if the OFT decides their behaviour was unfair for the last 8 years. Banks without government support - that's a real competitive market.

If the banks do not show some sense of shame for their actions and refund in full the unfair charges then we have to ask whether they can be trusted to look after the retail current accounts and savings of consumers in the UK at all. Existing banks should, perhaps, be allowed to return to their casino capitalism without any assistance from the government.

Perhaps the government should refuse to participate in the new share issue at Lloyds until it agrees to refund unfair charges. Perhaps it should force Lloyds into the Asset Protection Scheme instead by refusing to participate.

For most consumers in the UK they will see this decision as indicative of a system (legal and political) of consumer protection that does not work. It appears simply to operate in the interests of Big Business. It's not necessarily the Supreme Court's fault: the legal framework should have been constructed clearly to protect the consumer better and without the equivocation which allows lawyers to find ways to sidestep it. Successive governments in the thrall of big business and high finance are to blame for the failure clearly to protect the consumer from predatory big business.

By the way, the Supreme Court decision backed up my central point about the fact that when you deposit money you are lending money to the banks. It says: "At present, banks provide retail banking services on the basis that customers whose accounts are kept in credit (in other words who lend money to the banks) will not be charged for the services provided.." [emphasis mine].

I believe that the judgement here encapsulates for me the issue of exactly what is the British Banking system for? And why did we bother to save it?

I suggest we start to look at immediate ways to cut the banks loose to survive by themselves without taxpayers' money, (the sooner, the better - especially that share offer at Lloyds) and build a UK retail and business banking system from scratch. One which serves our economy rather than wrecks it, with new entrants and state provision. The current bailed-out banks have shown themselves to be inadequate, self-serving and shameless.

Perhaps we should now have all the money back; let's use it to lend and invest long-term. Let's lend and invest direct in our economy's future without the fundamentally immoral Big British Banks getting in the way and charging us for doing it.