ASIC should focus on product manufacturers post-CSLR
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) should be turning its attention to product manufacturers and institutions now that the Compensation Scheme of Last Resort (CSLR) is up and running, according the Association of Independently Owned Financial Professionals (AIOFP).
AIOFP executive director, Peter Johnston has told his organisation’s members that it is time for the financial advice industry be treated in the same manner as the legal and accounting professions “where minimal interference from Canberra bureaucrats or politicians is tolerated or allowed”.
He pointed to the situation with respect to the Law Society and the major accounting bodies where he said internal issues were normally quietly resolved or, where necessary, the Courts got involved to decide the outcome.
“With the CSLR now activated and the consumer-friendly Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA) effectively overseeing the Advice industry from an advice quality perspective, ASIC can then turn their attention onto the product manufacturer/institutional space where most of the problems over the past 40 years have occurred for consumers,” he said.
“You only need to look at the AFCA Annual Report where over 95% of consumer complaints are against the Institutions and they are 100% responsible for the $40 billion of failed funds over the past 30 years. Institutions are continually avoiding accountability over their conduct by spinning the blame onto the Financial Advice community and making large donations to political parties to mitigate negative outcomes.”
“Like most times when Canberra gets involved with policy outcomes, it is a poorly managed process and the taxpayer is left with the cost,” Johnston said. “The calibre of Politician has markedly diminished over the past 20 years since the Parliamentary Pension fund was abolished [October 9th 2004] and all political parties have had difficulty recruiting the best minds into seats. This is a critical issue facing Australia’s democracy going forward.”
“Around 10% of Politicians are currently in the old pension scheme, the rest are on the dole if unseated. Morrison was a classic example of no pension and a Sydney lifestyle to maintain, he could not give up his seat until an offshore job emerged.
Financial Advisers should be permitted to use their professional judgment when dealing with clients and Canberra Bureaucrats should be held to account for their professional judgment when dealing with our industry.”
“With the slide in popularity of the Albanese Government in recent times the chances of a 2024 Election now seems very unlikely.”
Advisers could only dream of such a situation.
Advisers are the scape goats for almost every financial issue according to ASIC.
With MIS left out of CSLR it cannot be any more clear how Corrupt Canberra is.
ASIC should re-open the case and properly investigate the financial planner they crucified (lost their houses, savings and nearly lost his family and suffered significant distress through this experience until now) for alleged churning of insurance products. Through some bogus complaint (manipulated information) regarding this financial planner, they alleged the financial planner churned insurance products and put his clients into an inferior product and claimed commissions from it (His superiors received the commissions as per evidence, not him). Turns out, this financial planner had no choice to represent himself at the AAT (no funds to hire a lawyer or barrister, spent $400k), Evidence shows new life insurance products had more features and benefits and monthly premiums was significantly lower. Materials was severely manipulated to make it look like this financial planner was a crook. This financial planner had no compliance breaches, received new Financial Planner of the year, Gold and Silver awards every year, 100 plus good character references from the community and industry & had all the awards, 3 independent experts was hired to investigate the matter and turns out there was no formal / verbal warning of any breaches and other financial planners were doing it and still practising. When the truth started to surface, executives and including ASIC delegate who ruined this financial planner’s life, retired/resigned and employed somewhere else. ASIC has ruined this person’s life including his family (I am sure ASIC staff have families themselves) by not investigating this matter thoroughly & properly, they simply relied on materials provided to them. Lastly, they alleged 49 client files was churned, however, when this financial planner, decided to represent himself for 2 days and asked for the 49 client files so he can thoroughly investigate, he has only received 20 client files, until now remaining 29 files have not been presented. Information on the judgement states, “retraining & monitoring this financial planner was a better option considering the truth was revealed”. ASIC need to take accountability for their significant errors and apologise. It is obvious this case was not properly investigated.
Must be the 45th or 46th time I’ve read this…