Pharmacy (Responsible Pharmacists, Superintendent Pharmacists etc.) Order 2022 Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Hunt of Kings Heath
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(2 years, 1 month ago)
Lords ChamberAt end insert “but that this House regrets that the Order does not make provision about the wider workforce challenges facing the community pharmacy sector”.
My Lords, I certainly have no objection to this statutory instrument, which, as the Minister said, requires a strengthening of the governance that relates to superintendent and responsible pharmacists. My complaint is that this could have been so much more. My principal purpose in tabling my amendment and allowing us to debate this is to talk about the potential of community pharmacy and my frustration that the Government are doing so little to support the sector. I find that quite extraordinary.
As the Minister said, the NHS is going through an incredibly tough time. We have a huge backlog of patients waiting for treatment, workforce pressures, scary ambulance waiting times, and there is a real sense of demoralisation in primary care. You would think that the Government would have welcomed with open arms the contribution that community pharmacy can make. Instead, however, it seems that the sector continues to be undervalued and starved of investment.
My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords who have taken part in the debate and to the Minister. The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, was right to raise the concerns of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. I was reassured by the briefing we had from the General Pharmaceutical Council. Clearly, it is something we need to keep a watch on.
As far as timelines are concerned—and I declare an interest as a member of the GMC—the Minister will be aware that there is a huge backlog of regulatory instruments that need to come forward to make changes to the regulatory system. I hope he will be able to give a great deal more priority to this issue over the next few months.
The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, mentioned dispensing doctors. Noble Lords will perhaps not be unaware that there is sometimes a tension between community pharmacists and dispensing doctors, but that does not mean that dispensing doctors do not have a valuable role to play in future.
The noble Lord, Lord Grade, made important points about closures and funding. I do not know whether anyone really understands how community pharmacy is funded. It is certainly a very complex situation, which in four years as the Minister responsible I am not sure I ever quite discovered. The noble Lord raised a substantive point there.
I was glad to have support from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. She spoke well about the fact that community pharmacies had to step up because access in other parts of primary care has become so difficult. My noble friend Lady Wheeler made an important point about minor ailment services and savings that could accrue to the NHS if community pharmacy were used more.
I was grateful for the Minister’s response. He painted the picture that in actual terms you could say the health service has more staff, but he will know that respected think tanks and analysts have been saying for many years now that, because of the nature of healthcare and demographic changes, we have to run very much faster to meet the new demands. That is where the problem arises in community pharmacy. The Minister will not be surprised that, because of the long-term challenges, many noble Lords in this House regret that the Government did not accept this House’s recommendation that we have a proper long-term workforce strategy which is funded to try to forecast and deal with those issues.
On the substantive issue of community pharmacy, it faces many challenges. Many community pharmacy businesses are facing a viability situation. I do not think that the current contract the Minister talked about is really doing what it needs to. I am hopeful about the talks that he mentioned and potential agreement in the future, but at the moment I doubt that the Government are really going to come up with the goods. It is a tragedy because here is a profession and a sector which could do so much more at a time of huge pressure. It needs to be given the wherewithal to do it. I wish to test the opinion of the House.