Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the roles and responsibilities of his Department's Pharmacy Rebalancing Board are.

The Rebalancing Medicines Legislation and Pharmacy Regulation Programme Board (the Board) was established to advise the Government and devolved administrations on how best to move from pharmacy practice matters set out in legislation, to an approach based on professional standards in line with other healthcare professionals. The Board is tasked to examine the respective scope of pharmacy legislation and regulation, and the interface between them, with a view to ensuring these are optimally designed to provide safety for users of pharmacy services, facilitating a systematic approach to quality in pharmacy and responsible development of practice and innovation, whilst reducing the burden of unnecessary and inflexible regulations.

The Rebalancing Programme Board’s full terms of reference are published at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/groups/pharmacy-regulation-programme-board