But there is a temptation to consider this new attempt by the FSA to grapple with the marketing of financial products in the UK as an indication of the failure of its earlier attempts. That would be unfair, though. Consider, for instance, Annex 3 of the report, which reviews the efforts of many other countries to address the same issue. Almost every westernised nation, it seems, is seeking to upgrade the quality of the purchase decision when consumers buy financial products. They have adopted many different approaches, but I suspect the FSA is correct in its conclusion that no other country has alighted upon a regime "that tackles the issues in a way that has worked better than in the UK". Nevertheless, there is still a big job to be done here.
The Review of Retail Distribution does not explicitly say so, but you cannot read it without concluding (or reinforcing your longstanding conviction) that the main root of evil in this sector is the payment of commissions by providers of financial products to financial advisers. The paper is, excusably, light on statistics, but the one on page 50 is a real standout: in the UK last year, no less than 63 per cent of single-premium individual pension sales were accounted for by switches from one provider to another … "which might suggest a significant amount of inappropriate [commission-generating] activity".