Levy ‘very pleased’ with Jones’ QAR announcement

Speaking on a webcast hosted by the Financial Services Council (FSC), Financial Services Minister Stephen Jones was questioned about the government’s response to the Quality of Advice Review (QAR), a review it had sat on for five months.

Mr Jones confirmed that had it not been for the budget, the government’s assessment of the review would have been publicised earlier.

“We will have a cabinet consideration in a few weeks’ time. I hope to be in a position in late May or early June,” the minister said.

He also predicted that the review could be implemented in several stages.

Namely, according to the minister, under the initial stage, the government would implement those more immediate recommendations, followed by the more controversial elements and then it would tackle the most difficult areas.

The QAR lead, Michelle Levy, submitted her final QAR report to Mr Jones on 16 December. Since then, aside from initiating a review of the review, the minister has offered very little insight into how the government feels about the 267-page report.

Responding to Mr Jones’ announcement on Thursday, Ms Levy told ifa she did not expect it and was “very pleased”.

“As to a staged implementation — without seeing it, it is hard to know — but if it [is] the easiest way to ultimately adopt the whole package, then I would have no objection,” Ms Levy said.

Mr Jones’ admission came just a day after FAAA interim general manager policy and advocacy, Phil Anderson, said on a post-budget webinar that the time would “absolutely” be right for an imminent announcement regarding the QAR.

“I think that the minister has signalled that he will make an announcement with respect to the Quality of Advice Review after the budget has been released. So, I guess it’s true that the minister has been very focused on the budget as one of the ministers in the Treasury portfolio, now hopefully after he has finished with selling the budget, he has a little bit more time to devote to moving forward and making announcements on exactly what he proposes to do with the QAR,” Mr Anderson said in response to a question posed by ifa.

“We’re going to be very helpful with supporting moving forward with that rapidly,” he added.

The FAAA had previously identified a set of “quick wins” from the QAR, which they believed could be implemented promptly and have a significant impact.

“Important priorities” the FAAA has flagged include removing the obligation to do FDS and rationalising fee consent, removing the obligation to provide statements of advice, and the rationalisation of the best interest duty safe harbour steps.

“They are three of the big things, there are other important proposals that we have supported, but if we could get those three up and going, it would be a great outcome.”