The chairman of the Financial Planning Association, Matthew Rowe, recently sent an email to all members of the FPA accusing certain sections of the trade media of "selective reporting" and acting with "clear bias" against members of the FPA and with "standards of journalistic practice and ethics" which needed to be held to account.
Rowe's full email is published here and Money Management's reply is below.
Dear Mr Rowe,
Firstly, we acknowledge that the chairman of an organisation such as the FPA confronts a difficult job. It cannot be easy juggling your membership, stakeholders in government, your commercial interests and of course us, the media.
In turn, we the media face our share of challenges and we would never claim we are perfect. Yes, from time to time you may think we get things wrong. When we do err, we do our best to correct those errors.
In reference to the email you sent to FPA members, we reject your assertions that we:
- practise selective reporting;
- knowingly bias our reporting;
- act with a low standard of journalistic ethics; and
- don't offer a right of reply.
We hope you understand that it is our role to report matters of public interest in this market and to do so without fear or favour. We believe we have done that since the day Money Management was launched in 1987 – the first publication to serve this market.
We believe the degree to which we have succeeded in delivering quality reporting unfettered by bias is reflected in our readership results, which independent research has always found to be the highest within industry trade media in Australia. Indeed, we have always fully understood that if we don't carry on this tradition our readers will make their own judgement by seeking to source their news elsewhere.
We always welcome constructive discussion, and consistent with our usual editorial policy we would offer the traditional means of right of reply.
Mike Taylor
Managing Editor
Money Management
