FPA says trade media biased and fails to meet ethical standards


The chairman of the Financial Planning Association (FPA), Matthew Rowe, last Friday 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.
"Such selective reporting is designed to create division and controversy, rather than report on fact, and without right of reply," Rowe's email said, at the same time identifying Money Management as one of the trade media groups he is referring to.
He goes on to appeal to his members to ignore a survey being conducted by Money Management in which readers are being asked their views on a number of industry organisations, including the FPA, whether they hold multiple memberships and whether they get value for money.
Somewhat ironically, the early results of the survey fall heavily in favour of the FPA, although so far the sample size is not statistically significant. If you are interested in taking part in the survey and getting it over the line of statistical significance so we can publish the story, please click here.
Two months ago, the chief executive of the FPA, Mark Rantall, complained to Money Management about a story it published on third-party research by Wealth Insights which attempted to quantify engagement levels of FPA members.
Rantall said that he felt the research was flawed and the story biased, and requested it be removed from the Money Management web site.
Rowe's full email is published here and Money Management's reply is published here.
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