All of that is true but the really big elephant in the room is...

All of that is true but the really big elephant in the room is that most licensees only ever existed to sell products.

During the 1980's and into the nignties the big mutuals like National Mutual, Colonial Mutual, AMP and plenty of others sold products with high upfront commissions and the promise of good long term returns. Often these were "hard sold" to people who didnt understand them by "agents" of the big mutuals. This prompted many reviews by government, resulting in a framework that demanded transperancy. They created a licensing regime and ultimately we saw the agents begin to be called Financial Advisers/Planners. The big players like AMP and others set up advice licensee businesses where they basically subsidised the fianncila advisers licensing costs in return for having an army of sales people selling their products. For many years now we have had the "advice" industry trying to become a profession by requiring advisers to have an education and act professionally but - for many reasons - it hasnt really taken off.
My personal opinion is that no proffessional person can provide professional finacnial services when they are working with any product issuer. What we saw with AMP adviser claiming the weaponization of compliance audits and charging insurance fees to deceased people was just a symptom of a bigger problem. That problem is product sales people masquerading as professional financial advice providers.

The removal of financial product issuers from the professinal advice space would solve many problems. Sure, allow sales people to sell products the same way as car salespeople sell cars but, do not pretend that they are selling advice. Professional Financial Advisers should be providing quality advice, free from threats and bullying to sell products for an overlord.a