Addressing the Stockbrokers and Financial Advisers Association 2021 Conference, Labor financial services spokesman Stephen Jones said he believed it would be appropriate for the parliamentary joint committee on corporations and financial services to conduct an inquiry into the standards body, which is due to be scrapped at the end of this year.
“I think for all the issues [the SAFAA] has raised and a bunch of issues other associations have raised, this warrants parliamentary scrutiny,” Mr Jones said.
“There are two parliamentary committees that have been set up to do that and aren’t, so I would suggest you use your resources to ensure that one of the two committees, either the corporations or the economics committee – I would suggest the former as the one that produced the original report [into advice misconduct] – would be the right committee to conduct a review of this. It’s beyond time.”
Mr Jones said Treasury’s decision to absorb FASEA’s standards-setting powers as of 2022 was proof that the body had not delivered on its mandate to properly implement effective ethical and educational standards for the industry.
“The debacle that its implementation of the standards has been should be reason enough,” he said.
“The fact the government has had to ditch it and drag it back into Treasury is evidence that there’s plenty to see here and something should be done.”
I just did the exam this month it was a complete joke and sad to see older advisers distressed over whether they would still have a business in 7 months time or not, even after 30+ years of loyal service to their clients. Here’s an obscure question for you all to consider: “True or False – It is reasonable to conclude that some financial advisers believe that they can pick outperforming (1) Fund Managers (2) Certain Stocks? I’m sure these type of trap questions will lead to better consumer outcomes eh!?!
I personally believe its Discrimination against us older, mature advisers, we should be able to take somebody to court and legally challenge this !!
i dont trust jones either
Stephen Jones is just putting the boot in to gain political points.
The very same party that said providing an extension of the exam would be merely delaying consumer protection mechanisms desperately needed in a sector. Just remember also that FASEA did consult with industry and you’ll recal the FPA gloating about how they “gifted” the meaning of degree to FASEA.
https://www.ifa.com.au/news/18801-fpa-members-question-fasea-links
yawn .. bats for both teams
The exam is nothing more than a scam! Getting rid of so many experienced good advisers and risk writers who have little chance of completing it ——-etc.
Yes the exam is a scam.
It’s not that hard though.
If you spent a week of your valuable time studying well you would surely pass.
And for the older guys that gives you until end of 2025 to still work.
4 years extra work time for passing a stupid exam. A valuable 4 years with a good cost benefit of time wasted for reward.
What is the biggest scam is forcing 55+ year old adviser with bucket loads of experience back to Uni.
That takes 120 hrs (3 full weeks lost work time per course wasted that could be productive paid work) plus the exam costs, uni fees etc. Realistically about $40,000 per course. X 6 courses or so.
Given the limited amount of years left to work it’s not very cost beneficial. The closer to retirement post end 2025, obviously the worse it is.
It’s literally a speed typing exam; the questions are designed to assume your client is an asshole, and will knife you and the government at anytime. It’s comparable to reporting to the Gastapo imo. The more you know, and the more you consider the ethics you’ll just unwrap onion layers of concerns about conflict of interest. Mean while Government can off load contaminated development land to public and no accountability. Let the industry burn, we’ll rebuild when common sense becomes a political requirement.
Top of the agenda for any inquiry should be the conflicts of interest of training providers on the FASEA Board, and how they have shaped FASEA’s recognition of prior learning and CPD policies to favour their own commercial interests. Advisers are being forced to study the same stuff over and over again to line the pockets of these dodgy “ethicists” and “academics”.
Yep FARSEA board fail everyone of their own values and codes.
Disgusting hypocrisy.
Full financial benefit disclosure required and more importantly they should not be acting if they have Any Conflict of Interest.
Which clearly most of them do.
True and well said
I do not trust this man, or his party. They are deeply conflicted through their connection to Industry Funds. They are not our friends.
This sounds more like Stephen Jones wants to get the parliamentary inquiry to take the heat of Industry Super and IFM to investigate FASEA. All politics.
Pure political point-scoring. Stephen Jones wants advisers gone altogether, unless they work for the industry funds. If he genuinely wants to support the industry, he should commit to keeping life insurance commissions and no more ‘reforms’, unless they actually result in better client outcomes.
This is a trap. Stephen Jones wants to make it even harder for financial advisers to work.
Hope so.
I wonder who you work for.
Finally some common sense into the debate
Hopefully the role of the FPA and the deal they did with the CBA which lead to FASEA will also be examined. As well as the relationship between the FPA, their separate entity FPEC, the CEO of FASEA…Certainly some questions to answer.
I am as critical of the FPA as the next person….but seriously what are you talking about? you just make shit up and hope it sticks…. provide some proof or stop this baseless rant.
He is an idiot playing politics with us.
I’m encouraging my clients to pick an independent and not either of the major parties or greens.
Just deal with it and get on with advising…?
The industry is broken. What are you talking about ?
Yet Mr Jones didn’t support the FASEA exam extension legislation… does he really care or just political shenanigans only perhaps?
the FASEA Code of Ethics are messy, contradictory, impossible to truly abide by and difficult to enforce. They read as though they are hastily put together with little/no consultation with those who are actually practising in the industry.
They should be re-written through a proper process which takes into account the realities of adviser/client interaction and the fact that Conflicts of Interest are inherent in all professional services, and cannot be 100% avoided at all times.
We don’t need a parliamentary enquiry to achieve this. Just a comprehensive review & update of the actual Code itself.
It needs to be scrapped altogether! Its duplicitous and totally unworkable. Its like it was designed by hippies who are looking for a perfect world result in every situation (always at the advisers expense), which is absolutely impossible.
The fools at FASEA who created their Code of Shambles are happy as long as the adviser spends the maximum hours possible explaining and double explaining every damn thing imaginable, that while the adviser does all that, he also treats every client like they’re 5-year old children; that the adviser then gets paid as little as possible for all that work and that when ANYTHING goes wrong after all that, they still get to ping the adviser for it!
Like a former AFA CEO used to (frustratingly) always say at the beginning of every one of his press releases….”We welcome this” Bring it on Labor!
This is absolutely warranted. FASEA has been an absolute disaster and utter debacle.
We need effective principles-based regulation that makes bad behaviour an individual aberration rather than a corporate strategy. This is something accountants and lawyers had for a long time and we won’t be a profession until then. A code of ethics is an essential part of this and, yes, the current code is a truly awful piece of work.