While Ontario’s move to consider the regulation of financial planners has made one industry group happy, the province’s determination to push its public pension plan forward is raising concerns from another.

Toronto-based Financial Planning Standards Council (FPSC) states it is encouraged by the fact that the Ontario government has appointed a committee to study the idea of regulating financial planners.

See: Ontario budget: Regulating financial planning

“The ongoing lack of clarity in the current environment as to who is permitted to hold themselves out as a financial planner leaves Ontarians extremely vulnerable,” says Cary List, president and CEO of the FPSC.

The committee is mandated to provide recommendations and will submit its final report to the government by early 2016, according to the budget document.

A private member’s bill to regulate financial advisors in Ontario had been initially introduced in February 2014. However, the bill was unable to go forward when a provincial election was called later that year.

The Toronto Financial Services Alliance (TFSA), on the other hand, is sharing their unease with the continued focus on the Ontario Retirement Pension Plan (ORPP). The government has stated the ORPP will be in effect in 2017.

See: Ontario budget: ORPP administrator announced

“Almost two million Ontarians already benefit from workplace retirement savings plans and the proposed final design of the ORPP undermines these existing plans,” says Janet Ecker, president and CEO of the TFSA. “Many Ontario employers already have generous plans and will be unable to afford the additional costs the ORPP will have on their businesses.”

The TFSA is applauding Ontario’s focus on other initiatives concerning the financial services industry. These include its involvement in helping to establish Canada as the first trading hub in the Americas for the Chinese currency, the renminbi; and the province’s commitment to the federal government’s plan for the Cooperative Capital Markets Regulatory System.

It also welcomes the government’s $130-billion investment in infrastructure projects over the next decade.

“This continued commitment to invest in infrastructure positively impacts Toronto’s increasing success as a growing international financial centre,” says Ecker.