The Government Minister responsible for community pharmacy in England made it clear at a meeting of the Parliamentary All-Party Pharmacy Group on December 12 that he wanted to see changes to the community pharmacy contract.
"The national contractual framework needs re-engineering in relation to community pharmacy,"Lord Hunt said. "There is a need to tackle outdated restrictions. It is as much in the interests of the profession as it is of the Department of Health to take a radical look at the contract."
Lord Hunt told the meeting that the pharmacy plan would make it possible to ensure that what pharmacy did was consistent with what the National Health Service was about.
Drawing attention to the £30m allocated to the development of medicines management, he said that investment by the Government was important. He added that there was also potential for using existing resources more effectively.
Lord Hunt made it clear that he wanted a momentum for change to be created. One area in which the Minister wanted to see early movement was the provision of out-of-hours services. A report on out-of-hours medical services (PJ, November 18, p745) had found the availability of medicines out of hours to be confused, complex and inconsistent. It was a priority to sort this out and proposals would be made early in the New Year.