From Mr S. I. Dajani, MRPharmS
SIR,-I decided to go public with my concerns about transparency at Lambeth after exhausting all possible formal and discreet routes with no assurances in sight that I will ever get any answers in confidence. But delaying tactics are practised well on the Council. They inhibit progress and disadvantage the strengths of our profession.
My decision was not taken lightly and, even though I am fully aware of the consequences, something had to be done to show the members that it was not the majority of Council members who were failing them.
The salaries issue is a small piece of a jigsaw that has brought other issues to the fore of our proud profession. Apart from and in addition to Mr Khan's accurate account (PJ, August 12, p236) and Dr Evans's appropriate comment that the Society is facing financial disarray (PJ, August 12, p227), it shows that Council members have no authority anymore and that nothing has improved despite all the rhetoric about corporate governance. Instead we have a mysterious Remuneration Committee that has sprung out of nowhere, we have a huge deficit, we have reduced the number of important professional policies by way of compensation, and we have bought an expensive flat which will need furnishing. The PJ is in danger of losing its indepedence, there have been secretive senior staff pay increases, selective corporate governance procedures, and the list goes on.
To say the Council is unrepresentative is not true. It is being represented by and for a clique of senior Council members and some senior members of staff. All I ask is that the membership know to whom they should direct their frustrations and angst. This cannot be the Council; most members are trying to carry out their duties conscientiously but are being obstructed in the process.
In the light of this, how can Professor Veitch (PJ, August 19, p264) think we can truly represent the profession when we are denied information? Most of us did not know about the flat purchase until we saw copies of the C&D!
My questions still go unanswered; instead, we are being asked to save money from the "paper clip" budget in order to reduce the deficit and being denied authority to investigate where the huge outlays are going.
I am surprised that Professor Veitch feels that I wish to undermine the profession. All I am seeking to do is make the Council more representative and to help members feel that it genuinely represents them.
I have nothing to gain by puting my neck on the line in this way. I have at least 35 years before state retirement. That is impetus and incentive enough for me to want to get the Society's house in order so that it can leave a legacy stronger than that which is being left now. For the record, I believe in loyalty and collective responsibility, if all is above board and fair. I see Council members these days as having changed simply into acting figureheads, clearing up the mess made by others, deciding the odd bit of policy and sitting pretty. My main sympathies lie with the members who are paying more a year for less and for the majority of the Society staff who, like the members, get little gratitude and are powerless to do anything. Professor Veitch needs to realise the real damage was being done from within well before I ever came along and that my outburst, along with others, is a mere symptom of this fact.
S. I. Dajani
Member of Council, Royal Pharmaceutical Society