Planner enshrinement legislation runs out of time

The legislation legally enshrining the term 'financial planner/adviser' will now only pass into law if the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, delays the date of the Federal election and Parliament resumes sitting after the winter recess. 

The Financial Planning Association (FPA) has acknowledged that the legislation had failed to make its way into the Senate before Parliament rose on Friday for the winter recess.

FPA chief executive Mark Rantall said the legislation had not been handled by the Senate despite significant effort, lobbying and having the Bill labelled as non-contentious.

He said that regardless of last Friday's disappointment, the FPA would continue to pursue "this important legislation to ensure that financial planners are given the professional recognition they deserve".

The Shadow Assistant Treasurer, Senator Mathias Cormann, last week made clear that the Opposition would not have resisted passage of the legislation through the Senate if it had been put forward by the Minister for Financial Services, Bill Shorten.

"There was nothing preventing the Government from passing that legislation through the Senate," he said last week. "They rammed 55 Bills through the Senate using the guillotine and so-called 'time management processes'. There was nothing stopping them from making it 56 if that's what Labor wanted to do."