In a personal plea to guest speaker FSA Chairman Sir Howard Davies, Lord Hunt said: "I urge the FSA to deploy rigorous self-denial on new initiatives. Sir Howard, you have been lumbered with a complex and lengthy process whenever you want to change anything. As the number of new initiatives mounts, so the process backlog grows. And delay in the North Colonnade means delay for businesses.
"Businesses, especially small businesses, cannot keep up with a flood of papers, any one of which may contain a torpedo for their plans. In addition, the FSA cannot function if it becomes tied up in its own processes."
Looking back to the start of AIFA and the objectives which were set at the time, Lord Hunt asked: "Have we achieved what we set out to achieve? We wanted a single voice for the IFA sector, from the largest national to the smallest one-man band. And AIFA does indeed embrace every variety of IFA, with around three quarters of the market in membership. We wanted to be taken seriously as a trade body and as the representative voice of the IFA by the FSA, Government and anyone else with influence over the lives of IFAs.
"I am happy to stand by our record. We have changed agendas, not just responded to them, not least over CP121 and the introduction of the menu option. And there have been many other more subtle ‘hits’. Of course, there have also been misses. There are still initiatives which almost casually try to bypass the role of advice - despite all the evidence that the advice gap drives the savings gap. But, overall, there has been progress and I am delighted to have been associated with it."
