A senior dealer group head has made a call for industry unity in the face of continuing moves by some risk advisers to force an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) of the Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) to force a constitutional change because of unhappiness over the Life Insurance Framework (LIF).
Sentry Group chief executive and chairman, Murray Hills, has warned about the cost of disunity to the industry and counselled that the AFA and the Financial Planning Association (FPA) are the only bodies capable of long-term representation of the industry.
While expressing some sympathy for those advisers critical of the Future of Financial Advice (FOFA) and LIF outcomes, Hills was critical of the events which had unfolded around attacks on the AFA, stating: “Sentry took a very dim view when the LICG (Life Insurance Consumer Group) and one of its founders publicly turned on the AFA as this has now seriously detracted from the merits of their case, and adversely on the integrity of both organisations and the financial services profession as a whole”.
“No reasonable person can support an attack solely on the AFA and wonder why the initiator does not apply the same logic and tactic against the FPA — unfortunately it can only be interpreted as a personality clash,” Hill said.
“I am very strongly against public disunity in the industry particularly when it involves an opportunistic attack and outrageous statements by some individuals and other organisations on the AFA and the FPA. I am concerned that this infighting provides more grist to the mill to be used against all of us by the lawmakers and the regulator, not to mention the adverse media coverage and ultimately lack of confidence by consumers.”
“In my view the AFA and the FPA are the only formally constituted and properly structured industry associations with a long history over many years of representing advisers and lifting the educational and ethical standards of their members that have stood the test of time,” Hills said.
“They will still be around when others with short-term goals are gone and will then have to recover unnecessary lost credibility and rebuild the reputation of their members in particular and the industry in general.”
