And in recent years financial planners found some parliamentarians prepared, if not to champion their cause, then to at least not condemn them out of hand to question why financial planners were having to deal with presumed guilt even when events were perpetrated by accountants, product manufacturers or lawyers.
And among the parliamentarians to have given financial planners are fair hearing were the Liberal Member for the Sydney Northern Beaches seat of Mackellar, Jason Falinski, Queensland Liberal backbencher and former financial adviser, Bert Van Manen, and, of course, the somewhat pugnacious Queensland Senator, Amanda Stoker.
Sadly for financial advisers, Stoker has been elevated to the Government’s outer ministry as assistant minister to the Attorney-General, while Falinski has been moved off the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services where he was doing solid work in questioning ASIC.
So, as the Parliamentary year kicked off in Canberra, many adviser eyes were looking towards Van Manen to keep fighting the fight.
The good news for advisers is, however, that the new chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee, Queensland Andrew Wallace, has signalled that he has been listening to advisers within his electorate of Fisher covering the Sunshine Coast.
