Bank Charges are unfair! - Proof beyond any reasonable doubt? - Part 1

If you are amongst those who have been following this blog - we are nearing a conclusion.  If you are new to reading these posts - welcome!

To reach that conclusion we need to decide my role, and yours - yes indeed, you have a part to play in all of this - the single most important part of all - let me explain why.

Evidence is information that helps form a conclusion; proof is factual information that verifies a conclusion.

The many posts, so far, in this blog have contained evidence, I now intend to use that evidence (with some yet to be added) as proof sufficient to verify this conclusion:

Bank charges are unfair! 


In most Western legal systems there are two forms of proof - one related to a criminal trial and one related to a civil action in a court.

In a civil action, the proof required, on the evidence presented, is that a conclusion can be reached by a jury - on the balance of probabilities.

In a criminal trial, the proof required, on the evidence presented, is that a conclusion can be reached by a jury - if it is beyond any reasonable doubt.

I intend to take the harder of those two - proof beyond any reasonable doubt - that bank charges are unfair.

That is my task.  And, it ain't easy. Many would say it is well nigh impossible.

What is yours?

Well, we need a jury - you are the jury!


Ultimately - it will be your verdict alone which counts.

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Let's have a practice session.

In my last post, I gave you evidence related to a meeting of the Co-ordination Committee, consisting of the FSA, the OFT and the FOS.

I entered into evidence the "Minutes" of the first meeting of that committee - February 2011.

I asked you to see if they discussed the subject of "bank charges".

That was "evidence".  

Does it prove to you - beyond any reasonable doubt: 

- that the three bodies principally responsible in the matter of "bank charges" 

- that the three bodies most closely involved in the long running saga over "bank charges" 

- did not have that subject on their agenda?

You have the evidence - is it proof, beyond any reasonable doubt?

You are the jury! Reach your verdict.

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In each of the posts that follow - I will take forward some of the evidence presented earlier in this blog, I will also add further evidence, I will then use each item of evidence as proof that bank charges are unfair.

As I do so  - I would ask you to remember THE single most important requirement a court imposes on a witness - that they tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Remember this earlier item of evidence - from the Supreme Court Press Summary?

This appeal involved a relatively narrow issue. The Supreme Court had to decide not whether the banks’ charges for unauthorised overdrafts were fair but whether the OFT could launch an investigation into whether they were fair.

Lord Walker made clear that the scope of the appeal was limited – the court did not have the task of deciding whether or not the system of charging current account customers was fair, but whether the OFT could challenge the charges as being excessive in relation to the services supplied in exchange (Paragraph 3).

Is the reason why to date nobody yet has an answer as to whether bank charges are fair or unfair lies in whether - you the jury -  have been told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?