Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to help reduce the number of pharmacy closures.

Pharmacies play a vital role in our healthcare system. We are committed to expanding the role of pharmacies and better utilising the skills of pharmacists and pharmacy technicians. That includes making prescribing part of the services delivered by community pharmacists, as we shift care from hospitals to the community.

The consultation with Community Pharmacy England on the national funding and contractual framework arrangements for 2024/25 has not yet been concluded, and we are looking into this as a matter of urgency.

Pharmacies are private businesses and decisions to close reflect many factors. Patient access to pharmaceutical services remains good in England, with four in five people living within a 20-minute walk from a pharmacy, and twice as many pharmacies in the most deprived areas. Patients can also access approximately 400 Distance Selling Pharmacies, who must operate nationally and send medicines to patients’ home free of charge, and in rural areas, Dispensing Doctors can supply medicines.