Professor Deen Sanders, one of Australia's leading financial services experts, told this year CISI's Financial Planning Conference that planners had an "extraordinary" relationship with clients which often beat that of lawyers.

Prof Sanders, ethics and professionalism leader partner, Governance Regulation & Conduct, Deloitte Australia, believes the future of Financial Planning is very promising and it will become one of the leading professions - but there were obstacles in the way if it followed the pattern in Australia.

In a keynote speech opening the second day of the conference, he said a key part of planners' success would be their strong relationship with clients which would eclipse that of other professions such as the legal and accountancy professions.

He told delegates: "You have an extraordinary gift in your relationship with clients. You see people at their most extraordinarily truthful. It requires you to be so much better than lawyers."

He said that planners should "get to the core" of what it means to be a Financial Planner and what the "essence" of Financial Planning is and focus strongly on clients.

He believes that all professions are shifting models to focus on delivery to clients.

He said: "The future is professional and I'm very excited about it."

However, citing Australia, his home country, he said that were obstacles to growth which might also apply to the UK.

Looking at the Australia Financial Planning experience, where there are 25,000 financial advisers and Financial Planning is one of the key professions, he said big issues included the rising cost of compliance. Research had shown that there could be 3 full time compliance officers for every person giving advice due to the huge rise in compliance demands from regulators. 

Data suggested that the cost of a piece of advice to clients might be $2,500 but the cost of compliance to deliver that could be $14,000 or $15,000 which was not sustainable, he said.

Professional Indemnity costs have also soared in Australia and a lot of people were leaving the Australian advice sector with the profession expected to lose 40% of advisers over the next 10 years. Too few new advisers were joining the sector.

The CISI's annual Financial Planning Conference – one of the biggest events in the Financial Planning calendar – is taking place over two days, today and yesterday. 

The two-day event is at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel at the NEC for the second year running.

• Financial Planning Today will be reporting and Tweeting throughout the event – check back for more coverage.