The former chairman of the Personal Finance Society’s (PFS) financial planning practitioner panel believes in an ideal world the body would become independent of the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII) as it can be revealed that two further members of the panel are understood to have resigned.
Earlier this week Alasdair Walker announced he was stepping down as panel member and chairman of the PFS’s financial planning panel citing the ongoing dispute between the PFS and the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII).
Speaking to Health & Protection, Walker revealed he wanted a “complete reversal” of the current situation that saw the CII launch a takeover of the PFS, a move which it said was necessary due to “serious and significant” governance failures it alleges occurred at the PFS. The PFS board has rejected this and said the claims are not founded in documentary evidence.
“I just thought this [the CII] is not an organisation that I continue to align with accepting that they are likely to effectively subsume the PFS,” Walker told Health & Protection.
“And of course they effectively already have because they now have a majority of CII appointed directors on the PFS board for the first time in its history since 2004.”
Instead, Walker believes a complete separation of the bodies is necessary.
“I want autonomy of the PFS – a proper established supplier relationship [with the CII],” he continued.
“The PFS is a professional body for financial planners. The CII is the exams and qualification provider for that professional body and as a PFS member that is the structure as I see it. That is not the structure as the CII sees it.”
Walker added that with a completely blank slate, he thought the PFS should be “an independent body with strong links to the CII – potentially obtaining charter as an independent body where it meets the members requirements.”
“That would be the gold standard because you could have a proper audit of all supplier relationships,” he continued.
“Is that in anyway realistic? There are 20 million reasons why it isn’t, and so more autonomous group business would be a close second.”
Pair of resignations
Describing the mood among panel members, Walker revealed views were “mixed” on the current dispute between the two bodies.
“There are I think, without me, 12 members on the panel and I haven’t tried to influence anybody’s approach to that. I don’t think that’s my place to do that. I think it would be an overstep,” Walker said.
“I know two members have resigned – Gretchen Betts and Ben Beck. I don’t know about the others.”
The panel was established in September 2017, to encourage more personal finance professionals to embrace the use of financial planning tools and techniques that may help both professionals and their clients achieve excellent outcomes and influence the securing of more financial futures.
The panel resignations follow PFS president Caroline Stuart who tendered her resignation last week, issuing an explosive statement refuting the allegations of governance failures and detailing her reasons and highlighting the strain of the situation.
Health & Protection has contacted Gretchen Betts and Ben Beck for comment.