In a positive development this afternoon, Finance Minister Mathias Cormann has frozen the Government’s proposed wind-back of Labor’s future of financial advice (FoFA) reforms amid heavy criticism from the industry and community. From Chris Joye at The AFR:
Senator Cormann, who took over responsibility for the policy last week, said he wanted to “have a round of conversations with all of the stakeholders first and then go ahead when everybody that was on same page is back on same page”.
“I’ve just got in the job and have decided to pause the process on the FOFA regulation to enable me to consult in good faith with all relevant stakeholders before pressing the go button on our changes”…
This is win for both common sense and consumers. The FoFA reforms were born out of the collapse of Storm Financial and following a landmark parliamentary inquiry and three years of negotiations. To wind them back, and re-introduce commissions and other forms of conflicted remuneration, would have been a retrograde move.
Hopefully, this is merely the first step towards a withdrawal on FoFA by the Coalition.
