Writing in his column in the June 19 issue of the Spectator, Paul Johnson claimed that “there is no one quite so dead as a dead editor, or even a retired one”. As a former editor who has been retired for nearly 13 years, I regarded that as a warning against further intrusion upon the pharmaceutical scene. However, my inhibition was dispelled upon subsequently reading in the Times a comment to the effect that most people seem to ignore history so that the same disasters occur in the same embarrassing and entertaining fashion. I should know, because the recent history of The Pharmaceutical Journal is a sad example of history repeating itself, but more on that perhaps on some other occasion. This time, it is the history of the Society’s branch representatives’ meeting that concerns me.
A report in The Journal (May 22, p734) dealt with a discussion on the future of the BRM. Apparently, a “significant” drop in the attendance figures had prompted the Society’s Council to propose a review of the format of the meeting. The purpose of the review was to find out why attendance was so low and how the meeting could be made more attractive and profitable. Inevitably, it was “for the millennium” that a “new look” might be found.
One of the options that found favour among quite a number of those present at the May meeting was that the BRM should be incorporated into the British Pharmaceutical Conference, although one member aptly pointed out that many representatives arrived in London the day before the BRM and so were able to attend also the Society’s annual general meeting, attendance at which was poor and would be worse if the BRM were not associated with it. Another member pointed out that the BPC was a different type of occasion (from that of the BRM) with a different constituency. The two events should be kept separate, it was suggested. Another member argued that, although the attendance was small, it was the only forum available — a sentiment with which I agree.
The two letters from member published in the PJ subsequently were strongly in favour of preserving the status quo.
The question of linking the BRM to the BPC reminded me that years ago there was such a link. On checking, I found that the link had been broken as long ago as 1955. At that time, there were two BRMs — one in May (the day after the AGM) and one in September (on the first day of the BPC).
Strange to relate, the BRMs, as meetings held in conjunction with the BPC for the discussion of professional topics, started in 1922 when the conference came under the auspices of the Pharmaceutical Society, and the same year, indeed, when the Society’s branches were established. It should be noted, however, that the BRMs held during the conference were not strictly speaking part of the conference. In fact, branch representatives were not required to hold conference tickets.
It was the establishment of a second BRM, held in London in connection with the AGM for the discussion of motions put forward by the branches, that in due course allowed the conference meeting to deal with general professional subjects, which, in turn, led to the decision in 1955 by the Council to have specially designated professional sessions at the conference, open to all members of the conference, not just branch representatives.
The Council Statement on the matter (PJ, November 12, 1955, p455) pointed out that the new arrangement would restore an element which was present in the conferences before the 1922 agreement (when the conference came under the auspices of the Society) when papers on professional subjects were commonly included in conference programmes.
All that having been said, the Council, none the less, proposed as recently as 1977 that the BRM should be transferred from May to the first day of the British Pharmaceutical Conference in September. The reason for the proposed change was stated to be the need for economy (not a concept that seems to be familiar to the Society today).
Commenting upon the proposal, The Journal (March 26, 1977, p243) pointed out that, in representing its thousands of members, the Society had, in order to do so effectively, to maintain lines of communication between headquarters and the members. The main apparatus for that function was the branch network, and one of the most important domestic events in pharmacy each year was the branch representatives’ meeting, at which representatives from each of the Society’s branches met to discuss motions put forward by the branches on a wide variety of topics, some more important than others, but all giving expression to views currently held within the profession. The importance of the occasion was that it provided the Society’s Council with a clear idea of the state of opinion within pharmacy about a host of matters affecting the profession. While some of the motions that came before the meeting might be trivial, irrelevant, or even absurd, others had provided a fulcrum on which the profession had been levered forward.
I may add here that the proposal for a code of ethics for the profession was made by the Teesside branch in 1937.
I would also repeat what was mentioned earlier that the attendance of many branch representatives at the annual general meeting in May helps to amend the democratic deficit that would otherwise often obtain at that other very important meeting.
Because of the importance of the BRM, the PJ argued that any proposals concerning its future must be viewed with the closest concern, adding that economics had to conform to some scheme of priorities.
It seems clear that the 1955 decision to abolish the BRM held during the conference was a wise one which took account of reality and of the value of the evolutionary changes that had taken place. It would, therefore, be, in my opinion, ill-advised to reverse that decision. If the BRM is failing from a lack of representatives from the branches, it hardly seems likely that placing the meeting in a new environment would of itself provide a remedy. As the PJ said in 1977, what would be happening would be combining two meetings that, historically, have been separate in time and different in character.
Incidentally, the Council decided in November, 1977, to leave the BRM in London.
Mr Blyth, of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, was editor of The Pharmaceutical Journal from 1961 to 1986.