Time to get the job done on a discipline regime

Tom Ravlic

Courts have now brought closure to the case study from the Hayne Royal Commission related to Sam Henderson, the former celebrity adviser who once had a television program on Sky Business and his own advisory practice called Henderson Maxwell.

Henderson was fined $10,000 in total for two charges. The first of the charges relating to the issuing of defective disclosure documents resulted in a $7,000 fine. Another $3,000 fine was imposed for dishonest conduct.

The latter related to telling people he had a Master of Commerce when in fact he did not hold such a qualification in in the first place.

Henderson has also agreed to a two-year good behaviour bond.

While this is one of many of the issues reaching their tail end from the Hayne Royal Commission there is still a lingering question that ought to be in the back of the minds of a range of people.

Have professional associations registered the messages that ought to have been clear from the year-long sojourn through the innards and entrails for misconduct engaged in by banks, financial planners and other odds and sods working to meet key performance indicators that dealt with flogging products?

Kenneth Hayne and his legal team focused tightly on the processes related to the discipline of Henderson by the Financial Planning Association. It found that the process too long a winding road to get to a conclusion on the matter.

Professional organisations exist to serve the public interest and not just the interests of their members. Sometimes the interests of their members will accord with the public interest, of course, but this does not mean that they will do so all the time.

Interests of the vulnerable consumers and advice seekers must be at the forefront and disciplinary matters need to be dealt with expeditiously so that the consumer walks away feeling that their case had been dealt with fairly.

The community can take some comfort that there was some resolution, some closure in the Henderson case but the next big question to be resolved is what a statutory disciplinary process should look like.

It is necessary to come up with a model for the disciplinary process as outlined in Kenneth Hayne’s final report and get that job done.

Members of our community deserve to see that recommendation implemented as soon as possible as an effective disciplinary regime is just as much about preserving confidence in the profession as it is about righting wrongs for consumers.