Financial planning will struggle to become a profession if it fails to embrace the thrust of the Future of Financial Advice (FOFA) changes, according to Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) Commissioner Peter Kell.
Kell told a Money Management/Financial Services Council thought leadership event this week that the FOFA process was now "in the home straight" but that it was important that those in the industry embraced the underlying purpose of the legislative and regulatory changes.
"We all need reform to improve the quality of advice and increase the level of professionalism," he said, describing an environment in which product distribution was no longer placed ahead of the delivery of advice.
"The industry will struggle to become a profession if we don't embrace the need for that change," Kell said.
The ASIC Commissioner painted a picture of the current transition towards the new FOFA environment as being one in which those planners who were providing good advice were finding it a case of business as usual, while others would need to embrace change.
He suggested that there was still too much advice which would be regarded as poor.
