I have to confess to being in two minds about the key announcement from the Government this week about the rise in National Insurance and dividend taxation, ostensibly to pay for social care.

The next generation of Financial Planners is at last coming from a wider range of backgrounds, including graduate entry and that, mostly, is a very good thing.

The fall in life expectancy for men, revealed this week by ONS, was perhaps not such a big surprise given that more than 130,000 people have sadly lost their lives to Covid-19 over the past 18 months.

The unexpected resignation today of under fire CII CEO Sian Fisher is neither the end of the story for the Personal Finance Society, nor realistically even a solution to the crisis that has beset both the CII and PFS in recent times.

The money laundering regulations are supposed to be a dull but routine part of financial services business, as any Financial Planner will attest.

The pandemic is not over yet, far from it, and it is too early to predict the long term impact but if there is one certainty it is that many people’s retirement plans are changing.

Consumers just do not trust financial services firms, that’s the long and the short of it.

Whenever I hear of a new regulatory initiative designed to crack down on rogues or bad practice I always resist the temptation to cheer straightaway.

Clients are getting older, on average. It’s an inescapable fact that I was reminded of this week with the launch by St James’s Place of its Care Concierge service, aimed particularly at clients over-80.

It was good to get away last week for a break to sunny Devon, beating the G7 hordes heading to the South West.