The introduction of disclosure statements (DS) is something I have watched with more than a little interest.

The idea of the DS regime was to add more transparency to the industry and therefore help build a bit more confidence in the advisory sector.

So it was pleasing when the regime came in, how many advisers I spoke to who were quite happy to send a copy of their disclosure statement. It's been useful to see the different approaches taken and what level of disclosure advisers gave.

One of my initial thoughts on seeing statements though, was surely the remuneration model for the industry is wrong.

In the spirit of disclosure these documents list everything the adviser may use and the remuneration levels. In some cases the list of products and commissions ran to pages.

To the uninformed investor they would look at this and be amazed at all the fees and percentages. You could be excused for thinking some of the beat-up stories in the media maybe right. You know, "commission-driven salesmen" etc, etc.

It just looked like advisers were clipping the ticket left, right and centre and there was little left for the client. (Remember this is the perception from the docs, not necessarily the reality).

My thoughts are that the sooner we move to fee-based advice, the better.

My second line of thought on disclosure documents comes from some work we have been doing in ASSET Magazine. We have asked a number of advisers for their DSs, yet some have point blank refused to provide them and others, including senior advisers (that's in terms of experience, not necessarily age) have been quite hostile to these requests.

There appears to be a moot point whether DDs have to be given to a member of the public if they ask, or whether they just have to be given to clients and potential clients.

I don't think that is the issue.

The action of advisers to withhold DSs make it look as though these advisers have something to hide, and that may be their remuneration model is something they actually don't want to disclose.

If the industry wants transparency and to build its reputation, then advisers need to be upfront about what they do.