I am always impressed by how much Financial Planners do year round to help consumers. They give up free time and sometimes work time to help consumers understand the benefits of Financial Planning in its widest sense on a pro bono basis and, indeed, many give up their time and often their cash to volunteer in their local communities. It's a generous profession.

Crooks will always target pensions - that's a given - but that should not deter us from applauding the significant progress made this week in tackling scammers with a new law banning pension cold calling.

Editor: My 10 Wishes for Financial Planning in 2017

It’s traditional at this time of year to make predictions about the coming 12 months. Being somewhat of a contrarian I’m not going to do that.

It’s not a merger but it is a step forward for the Chartered adviser bodies and the Financial Planning profession and it’s long overdue.

The debate on the value of Cashflow Modelling as part of ‘true’ Financial Planning has become a heated one, as we’ve discovered on Financial Planning Today.

Pension tax relief, particularly for higher rate taxpayers, is a hugely used element in the Financial Planner’s arsenal but it’s future may well be in jeopardy along with the Treasury’s commitment to fund pension saving with generous tax benefits.

News this week that the FCA has launched a campaign to protect the over-55s from financial fraud will probably have been ignored by most Financial Planners and Paraplanners. At the very best it will have received token interest. That’s a shame and that needs to change. Financial fraud is everyone’s problem and planners have a role to play in tackling it.

A lot of nonsense has already been written about Brexit today. I don’t plan to add to it.

A very warm welcome to our new website, Financial Planning Today - a service for all professional Financial Planners, Paraplanners, Wealth Managers and IFAs.