The federal opposition has vowed to allow accountants to play a bigger role in the provision of financial advice and address the ATO portal access issue should it win the election to be held later this year.
“In relation to accountants in the room, I’m supportive of bringing accountants back into the advice space. This is a top priority for me,” opposition financial services spokesman Luke Howarth told attendees at the SMSF Association National Conference 2025 held in Melbourne last week.
“I respect accountants greatly. I think what they do, what you do, is good for Australians and [helps] Australians, and [accountants] are some of the most trusted people that we have in the country.
“The current limited licensing model is not working. When we have a lack of advice, particularly specialised advice which overlaps with tax and accounting, this doesn’t make sense to me.
“Crucially it means it is more costly to get a self-managed super fund set up and I know the SMSF Association has done some good work to develop options [as to how accountants can be included in the advice framework] and I’ll be looking at those closely if we’re given the opportunity to form government.”
Concern was also expressed over what he described as the Albanese government’s attack on accountants through the sudden change in the tax agents’ code of conduct.
“This came completely out of the blue [and] for the sins of a few they want to implement [this for] every accountant and tax agent. It was an outrageous move made by the government as part of a deal with the Greens party in the Senate,” he noted.
According to Howarth, should the coalition win government, it will address the issue regarding the current limited access to a client’s ATO portal as well.
“I’m also supportive of financial advisers being provided access to the ATO portal. Tax agents and accountants can do this, but financial advisers generally can’t,” he acknowledged.
“I know this is a big issue for advisers, particularly those dealing with self-managed super funds. Treasury has started some of the initial work on the practicalities of this and so I look forward to supporting the next steps given the opportunity.”
