Good news for agrarian socialists: if your champion Barnaby Joyce ever makes it to Finance Minister, you will finally get your revenge on the banks, one way or another. Politics is not my brief I know, but after reading Barnaby Joyce’s latest twaddle I cannot restrain myself.

Pay-TV is not allowed in our house, so I missed the Joyce interview on Sky News – but this is what he had to say yesterday: “Westpac, under the cover of darkness, has jacked up rates way beyond where the RBA (Reserve Bank of Australia) has done it and have done so because they can.”

The statement, to me, demonstrates a lack of understanding as to why Westpac did this in the first place – to manage their balance sheet in the way they feel they have to.

You're going to manage bank balance sheets for them in the future Barnaby? Where would St George be today if it had been left to fend for itself I wonder?

Okay, the 'banana smoothie' PR exercise was ill-considered, and they deserve all the lampooning they got for that. But my guess is that they did not jack up rates 'because they can', but more likely because they had to.

Joyce also prattled on that the government should have the power to break up banks that are: “not diligent in how they respect the Australian community.” And how would you break them up? What, split out Bankwest from the CBA, etc? Split off the business bank from consumer bank? How exactly?

Obviously the market is not taking very seriously the prospect of Joyce being Finance Minister any time soon – otherwise bank stocks would have been trashed yesterday.

Joyce should ask himself, how is it that Australia’s major banks rank among the best in the world in terms of their robustness in the face of the GFC? How would their ratings go if Joyce’s Damoclean sword were ever brought to the table?

The role of the government should be to ensure there is adequate competition in the market for financial services. Then let the market do its job. So by all means, let's listen to the likes of David Liddy when he calls for ACCC to keep a close eye on the majors.

But let’s keep it real.