What drives the Regulator in its crusade is its concern that investors are poor judges of their own best interest. The FCA takes the view that a fund manager is not ‘just’ a product provider, but also the agent of every investor that becomes a unitholder.   A few short years ago the market structure had clearly defined separation of roles with IFA as agent, responsible for the selection of products from a wide range of providers for the client, and provider or fund manager responsible just for managing money.

RDR destroyed that model. 

With thanks to http://www.owlrc.co.uk/news