The poll in a recent BT Academy webinar saw 48 per cent of participants say that a separate new body should be created to monitor compliance with the FASEA code of ethics, while 37 per cent said they thought the new body should form part of FASEA itself.
Just 10.4 per cent said they thought industry associations such as the FPA should be responsible for code monitoring, while 4 per cent said the responsibility should lie with the TPB.
The data follows recent comments from law firm The Fold Legal that the government’s proposed adviser disciplinary body could be delayed until late 2021, and the recent suggestion from the FPA that the body, when it is created, also be responsible for registration and licensing.
Some industry stakeholders have suggested the FPA is seeking to create a role for itself in helping to maintain a register of advisers if ASIC hands this task to the new disciplinary body, with Synchron director Don Trapnell commenting in a recent ifa podcast that the association’s proposal was “self-serving”.
“I think the FPA sees itself as somehow being the one peak body, [but] in our lives we need to have choices and there are a number of other associations out there that do just as good a job as the FPA,” Mr Trapnell said.
“The challenge is, the biggest licensee out there, AMP, has 1,200 reps. These are big numbers, [and] taking away those organisations, the licensees, and who monitors the adviser? No good saying a single association would do it, because they can’t monitor 20,000 people.”
However, Mr Trapnell supported the need for less competing regulatory bodies in the advice space, rather than adding further layers of compliance for advisers to answer to.
“The current system basically involves advisers answering to five groups of regulation, their licensee plus the other government groups, and to bring that down to one single regulatory authority makes a lot of sense,” he said.
“It has to make life a lot easier for the adviser and therefore lower the adviser’s cost, and if it lowers the cost it is good for the consumer.”
FPA head of policy and standards Ben Marshan recently told ifa the association did not envision a specific role for itself if the industry was to move to a self-registration model, other than knowledge sharing with the incoming disciplinary body.
“Based on the government’s announcement in October last year it will be an independent disciplinary body run by the government, so the FPA won’t have direct involvement,” Mr Marshan said.
“However, the FPA did a lot of work preparing to launch, test and revise Code Monitoring Australia. Through this process, the FPA went through a lot of iterations for how a disciplinary body can be set up, so we have the experience and information to share with the new disciplinary body.”
We cannot possibly have the FPA involved in anyway. Chief Justice Haynes said they were not capable of being a code monitoring body and they represent Union Super Advisers and institutionally aligned advisers. Every move they’ve EVER done is not for the good of Australians or planners, it’s only done to bolster their ranks. For that reason, it’s why FPA advisers are the bottom of the barrel. If the FPA were involved in any way it would imply the FASEA codes of conduct are a complete joke.
Yet another licensee trying to protect their inhouse product revenue by attempting to discredit the FPA’s proposal for individual registration.
Sorry Don & Matthew & Ray & Eugene & Angus & Renato & Alex. You are the problem, not the solution.
They don’t get it, do they?
Their logic is circular, at best: We need licensees because we have licensees. And isn’t it funny those perpetuating this circular idea stand to lose the most from common sense wading into this game?
We have laws, regulations and then on top of that we have each licensees ‘different interpretations’ of these laws and regulations.
How can two advisers – one from AMP, the other from Centrepoint, for instance – have different (licensee) rules to comply with?
Why? How have we allowed this to happen?
The law is the law – we need one central disciplinary body, not 2,000 different licensees.
Literally not one ‘problem’ identified by the self-interested can’t be solved.
Except for the end of the gravy train.
Dear FPA scum. Could you please explain why the FPA is proposing this now, and not 20 years ago when I wrote to them and every other year for decades. Oh wait it’s because 1) the banks aren’t around any more so it’s ok and 2) they want to be part of the registration process and handcuff advisers to an association. Much in the same way as TPB registration and the list goes on. If it’s an FPA idea it’s pure self serving sh%@#$t. Could you please explain why you haven’t become self licensed, when it’s cheaper to be self licensed. Oh wait, too risky? We now have individual registration, I pay ASIC every friggen year a fee to be registered.
The public hostility towards the FPA confuses me.
Have they always been perfect? No.
But have they vacuumed millions out of the pockets of clients and advisers over the years while lining their own pockets via the sheer corruption of vertical integration? No.
Yet they’re painted as the largest villain in these comments by the usual enraged suspects.
To echo your charming phrase – couldn’t you say that if licensees are against the idea, then that’s just self-serving excrement?
Some facts that are perhaps inconvenient to the frothing hatred so many advisers have for the group:
1) They have, repeatedly, made it clear that they do not wish to be the disciplinary body.
2) Those criticising the FPA’s proposal are the ONES WITH THE MOST TO LOSE.
3) I’ve never been a member of the FPA before – but joined because this policy announcement is the most sensible thing I’ve seen in this industry in over a decade.
Licensees reach their hands into advisers pockets every day and profit off their labour, liability and clients. They provide – in aggregate – little to no value, while managing to jack up the price of financial products through their incessant ticket clipping.
They make millions a year, pay inflated salaries to empty suits unlikely to build a career in any other role more demanding of ability or value, AND inflict untold amounts of uncertainty and risk through their inconsistent ‘interpretations’ of the laws.
But the FPA is the problem? Please.
Know your enemy.
Also, “the” FPA is not the same organisation it was when many of its poorer decisions were made. There is regular renewal of management and board members, and consequently there is evoluton in policies and practices. Their policy about removing dealer groups from adviser licensing is a great example of how far the FPA has evolved.
Indeed.