Your IndustryNov 27 2015

Libertatem launches £50k FSCS campaign

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Libertatem launches £50k FSCS campaign

Trade association Libertatem has launched a campaign to raise £50,000 by Christmas in order to lobby the government over FSCS levies.

Garry Heath, director general of new trade body Libertatem, said: “We are raising £50,000 for a lobbying campaign. IFAs have nodded off. They are not members of Apfa. Hardly anyone is a member of a trade association. Advisers are sleepwalking to the end of the year.”

Mr Heath compared advisers to pandas who are “too busy eating bamboo to realise they’re an endangered species” and warned that heavy FSCS levies will mean adviser firms will walk out of the industry.

He said: “We at Libertatem suggest advisers can’t live in the high-cost world being created by the regulator. We need to find a new way of paying for FSCS. We need physical support.”

As part of its research, Libertatem asked members to send in their FSCS invoices. An analysis found that the increase in regulatory costs over five years varied from 220 per cent to 107 per cent, with an average inflation rate of 140 per cent year on year.

Adviser view

Chris Hannant, director general at Apfa, said: “The FSCS funding is going to be reviewed next year. We’re talking to government and FCA about this in the context of FAMR.

“I’ve seen Mark Neil, chief executive of the FSCS to talk about funding options as this has been a priority of Apfa through the summer.”