The FAAA has outlined the direction of its future policy platform which has key themes around accessible advice, professionalism and the use of technology.
The association is seeking input from its members into its draft policy platform as it begins its 2024 roadshow series around Australia.
General manager policy, advocacy & standards, Phil Anderson, told the first day of the roadshow in Albury-Wodonga that the policy platform will guide the FAAA’s advocacy activity with government, regulators and other stakeholders.
It focuses on the three key themes:
- Accessible financial advice
- Professionalism of financial advice
- Using technology to better deliver financial advice
Anderson says that by travelling across the country and engaging directly with members “…the FAAA aims to finalise a policy platform that will provide a strong framework for advocacy and best represents the views of its member base.”
He says the association would like to see a single set of easy to understand rules that govern how to deliver affordable, professional financial advice, in a clear, concise and engaging way.
“By simplifying the regulatory regime and improving access to advice, it will drive down the cost and create a consumer-focused profession.”
He adds that it’s also important “…measures are in place to ensure that there is continued focus on the professionalisation of financial advice…”
Anderson says that for financial advice to be recognised and for it to operate as a self-regulated profession “…we need to first establish the framework, maintain effective and appropriate education standards across all financial advice providers, while at the same time providing flexibility for new entrants to meet the education standard and join the profession.”
Ongoing development of the financial advice profession and advice practises, through the use of technology and innovation, is also a theme of the draft policy platform.
…We need to future-proof the profession … through better use of data and technology…
“We need to future-proof the profession for advisers and their clients through better use of data and technology.”
He says the FAAA supports regulatory reform “…that encourages the use of new technology, specifically AI, to make data capture, storage and utilisation more streamlined across financial services, which will deliver better service and outcomes for clients.”
The association is making the draft policy platform available for members for review and to provide feedback until 31 May 2024. It will release the final FAAA Policy Platform on 1 July 2024.
The most important part of any development, are the foundations that the development sits on.
The foundations of the Advised Life Insurance sector were sitting on solid bedrock, though the Government, after consultation with vested self interest parties, convinced the Government that moving that part of the framework to a foundation of quick sand would be wonderful improvement.
That “worked well” and even the biggest beneficiaries, being the Education lobbyists, who were too caught up in their own self importance and intellectual prowess to even bother listening to the experts at the Coal face who warned everyone there would be a mass exodus of Advisers unless changes were made, were shocked at the low numbers of entrants and have had to go begging for funding due to their hundreds of millions of dollars of future revenue disappearing, just like the Advisers who were being blackmailed into paying them, disappeared.
In order for the education guru’s to make money, they need a willing, not forced participant and the mirage always dissipates eventually to reality if there is insufficient reason or incentive to join.
The pathway for a specialist Life Insurance Adviser is a maze of complexity, smoke screens and mirrors with no incentive to start the journey, hence the end result being, virtually NIL new entrants in the last few years as specialist risk Advisers on one side of the ledger and thousands exited on the other.
What a great achievement and for all those who were part of the grand plan, you should hang your heads in shame.
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