“When I joined the CII I made clear my commitment to leading the whole group for all its constituent parts and membership, and that remains the case. I know I speak for all senior CII colleagues in that respect."
The chief executive of the CII went on to say he was “very comfortable” with all the obligations, legal and professional, that come with his position.
“I would not have agreed to become a director of the PFS if that were not the case. I personally have quite considerable experience around the board table, including in identifying and managing conflicts of interest.
“While that is important, however, it is not my prime concern in approaching this role. I think both PFS and CII can be best in class and that is what me and my colleagues are working hard to achieve,” he added.
Morris also received a response from Phillips who said she supported the recent appointments.
She said: “They collectively provide much better access to the resources and systems that the PFS needs to build its offer to members than it has had for quite some time.
"I would encourage PFS members to see that much more as a cause for excitement and optimism than investigation. That is certainly the way that I see it.”
Alasdair Walker, managing director at Handford Aitkenhead & Walker and former chair of the PFS’s financial planning panel, told FT Adviser he had received the exact same response from Phillips to an email he had sent to the chair.
According to Walker, 10 to 15 other members had also got in contact with him to say they had emailed the CII voicing their concerns with all of them receiving similar responses.
“It is disappointing that against what appears to be a growing body of evidence of the mishandling of the situation, the CII has no interest in being questioned by members as shown by its canned responses,” he said.
Walker believed the appointments last week was a “big action” in itself and created a window of opportunity for the CII to consolidate what they “were trying to do”.
He asked: “Why are appointments more important than governance and why is the CII not talking about challenges to conflict of interests?”
In response to Walker's comments, the CII wanted to highlight the reason members received the same response to their emails was because Phillips had received the exact same email from multiple members and therefore each email warranted the same response.
alina.khan@ft.com
