Nationalize the entire circus.

We should have some form of Faster Payments scheme, backed by the state, because cheap, reliable transaction networks are the sort of infrastructure that's good for business. At the very least, this screams "make FedNow the default payment rail". Then if people actually want to spend money that isn't theirs, let lenders build something pluggable on top, so their costs and needs are solely limited to the credit aspects, rather than skimming of of every single transfer of value.

Yes and just wait for the “public alternative” to play political games with which merchants they accept.

There is already a low transaction fee network that works over the current infrastructure - debit cards.

Sure, you can wait another decade for that to happen or just play the game for today's money and benefits.