For its submission to the Financial System Inquiry (FSI), the MFAA has sought support from the Financial Planning Association of Australia (FPA), the Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) and from the Commercial Asset Finance Brokers Association (CAFBA).
“Where possible, it is important to provide the government with a comprehensive submission from the broader industry, rather than multiple small submissions that the government then needs to decipher,” MFAA chief executive Siobhan Hayden said.
The MFAA will make a submission to the government on three key FSI recommendations that impact members, including a prohibition on direct borrowing by SMSFs through LRBAs; protecting small business borrowers; and enhancing competition in the lending sector.
“This important initiative will ensure that the industry has input to this joint submission and we are very keen to gain input from the broader industry community,” Ms Hayden said.
The MFAA’s initiative to unite the industry bodies comes after former MFAA president and Bernie Lewis executive chairman Mark Lewis told SMSF Adviser’s sister publication The Adviser last year that the industry groups representing financial planning, mortgage broking and accounting must form deeper relationships to aid the convergence of the professions.
“I think there needs to be some deeper relationships with FPA, AFA and all of the professional groups,” Mr Lewis said.
“There probably needs to be some deeper relationships built with the accounting associations.
“There needs to be some mutual respect between those associations and some communication from each of them out to their own membership that there is convergence starting to happen and that the associations are going to start working together to aid that convergence and facilitate that convergence.”
