| Statin switch
Dispensing
Packaging
Amateur radio
Reciprocity
Onlooker
The Charter
The Journal
Letters to the Editor
|
The Charter
Questionable claim
From Mr D. I. Simpson, FRPharmS
The Secretary and Registrar says that the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s
Council has taken full account
of the views expressed in two consultations
on the Charter and in more than 50 meetings held around Britain (PJ,
January 3/10, p16). If this were the case, the Charter object of promoting
the interests of the members in their exercise of the profession of pharmacy — something
about which members had expressed much concern — would be in the
draft Charter sent to the Privy Council. It is not.
Furthermore, the motions
passed at the special general meeting in June
(PJ, 7 June 2003, p802) — one of these called for the preservation
of the object to which I have already referred and another wanted a referendum
on the Charter — have been essentially ignored.
Douglas Simpson
Member of Council
Royal Pharmaceutical Society
Answers, please!
From Professor H. McNulty, FRPharmS
It gives me no pleasure to write this letter after I read about the
procedural and governance issues surrounding the Council’s acceptance
of the new Charter for the Royal Pharmaceutical Society. The article from Sydney Holloway (PJ, 13 December 2003, p810) makes salutary reading
on what might have been. The response
to consultation (PJ, 20/27 December
2003, p848) is, on the other hand, rather disappointing and gives few
clues about all the issues raised in the consultation process or the
Council’s views on these issues.
What debate was there on the matters raised by the Scottish Executive?
There is no reference to any consideration of these points. While the
resultant Charter is an improvement over previous versions, it was produced
in haste with last-minute changes that were not agreed unanimously — a
high-risk strategy with such an important document.
There are a number of questions to which I would like to have answers:
1. The Health Act was issued in 1999, so why did we find ourselves in
a position of disunity and apparent panic at the last minute of the process
over four years later?
2. When was the December 2003 deadline for the Charter first known? How
was this taken into consideration in drawing up the consultation schedule?
3. How was the first Charter consultation paper issued by the Society
without full prior discussion and approval by Council? (Whatever the
answer to this, rules of Governance must be written to prevent this ever
happening again.)
4. Why did the Council not withdraw the first draft Charter immediately
after serious problems were identified? This could have given time for
a proper consultation on a second version. (The intransigence of the
leaders of the process who saw no difference between objects and powers
or the need to accept early major changes is indefensible in hindsight.)
5. Why was the first draft not withdrawn immediately after the special
general meeting or the June Council meeting, which finally accepted the
need for change? (This would have still given time for preparing and
properly debating the second improved version within the December looming
deadline.)
6. Why were special general meeting motions seen as undemocratic and
then largely ignored by Council?
7. How could any Council members agree to sign off the Charter with less
than 75 per cent majorities in a number of votes and when some members
openly expressed concerns over lack of time for consideration?
8. Given the control the Charter exerts on professional activities, why
was the consultation on the topic of professional leadership left until
September and again a paper apparently largely devoid of anything but
a cursory Council discussion then issued?
There seems to be a lack of appreciation of the nature of the challenge
and the need to unify the profession in this process. Talk of wide consultation
is nonsense — branches had no chance of responding in the few weeks
allowed to agree the final Charter and there were few if any regional
discussions with Officers on the final draft. The Council and Officers
appear now to be exposed to public humiliation through court action.
This will weaken our professional standing in the eyes of government
and of other professions. What a sad end to such an exciting opportunity!
Howard McNulty
Glasgow
| |
Ann Lewis, Secretary and Registrar, Royal Pharmaceutical Society,
replies:
Professor McNulty raises some important questions. I will
address them in turn.
1. Even after a lengthy process of consultation and policy development,
those charged with taking final decisions will feel conscious of
their responsibilities. So it was for the Council in December but
there was no last-minute panic. Following consideration of the
Health Act in 1999, the Council established a working party to
develop proposals for reform. The Health Act Working Party sought
views on and produced recommendations for the Society’s fitness
to practise machinery and mandatory continuing professional development.
Proposals were submitted to the Department of Health. At this stage,
the Council recognised that these proposals were not necessarily
a long-term solution but could provide a way of achieving much-needed
improvements until it became clear whether more far-reaching reform
was needed. Since then, the external context has changed significantly.
We have seen further legislation, the reform of other health professional
regulators, the establishment of an overarching council of health
regulators, and the much broader interpretation of regulation set
out in the Kennedy report. In response, the Council initiated a
further programme of reform in October 2001. Pharmacists and others
have been consulted on a broad range of issues to inform the new
legislation and the new Charter. Decisions have now been taken
on the Charter but there is much still to be done before the reform
programme is completed.
2. The Council decided in March 2003 that the new Charter should be developed
alongside proposals for new legislation, in order to safeguard and strengthen
the Society’s integrated remit as a professional and regulatory body.
The extensive consultation programme undertaken between March and September
was designed with this in mind. At that time, we were aiming to complete the
decisions to inform the legislation in August and for final decisions on the
Charter to be taken in October. In the event, proposals for the S60 Order were
completed in October and decisions on the Charter in December. This allowed
the Council to publish a second draft Charter in October for any further comments
before final decisions were taken.
3. This is simply wrong. The initial draft Charter was agreed by the Council
to be issued as a basis for consultation — no more, no less. It was discussed
by the Council but was not put forward as the Council’s preferred draft
(PJ, 15 March 2003, p378).
4–6. The SGM motions were considered by the Council in June 2003. The
Council acknowledged the strong concerns expressed at the SGM but recognised
that it would not be proper to take decisions about the new Charter while a
consultation was ongoing. It is quite wrong to suggest that the Council has
not taken full account of members’ views. Certainly, it could not incorporate
every suggestion into the final draft Charter. This would never have been possible
because the Council has to act in the best interests of the profession as a
whole. The public, patients, government and other health professions also have
vital interests in the future of the Society. The Council has taken full account
of the views received, as shown by the important changes made to the draft
Charter in response to that feedback. Members have played a real part in the
development of the new Charter.
7. There was no requirement for approval of the final draft Charter by a specific
percentage of Council members, other than by a majority. In the event, the
final draft was approved by 70 per cent of Council members present and voting.
The timescale was tight but there was sufficient time for consideration. Every
Council member had the opportunity to speak on the draft Charter and to vote
either for or against the final draft.
8. External timetables have meant that the initial emphasis has been on the
Society’s governance framework and its regulatory functions. But it is
not right to suggest that no consideration was given to the Society’s
key functions of professional leadership and development before last September.
In fact, the Council’s decision to seek a new Charter provides the clearest
demonstration of its commitment to maintaining and building upon the Society’s
professional role. The discussion paper published in September was to inform
future work on describing credible and appropriate structures which, together
with the governing Council, could support the full range of the Society’s
functions in the future.
This is a lengthy response but I hope it provides clarification.
I agree that the new Charter represents an exciting opportunity.
I also believe that the new Charter, together with the new legislation,
will form a robust governance framework for the Society of the
future. |
The Council may have exceeded its powers
From Mr M. Koziol, MRPharmS
If any pharmacist had any doubt whatsoever that some members of the
Council were intent on turning the Royal Pharmaceutical Society into
a regulator at the expense of the representative role, then they should
simply study the front cover of The Journal of 13 December, which gives
a detailed view of the Privy Council
petition.
The petition claims that the Council believes that the Society should,
for the public benefit, be more appropriately equipped to function as
a regulator. It does not mention representation of pharmacists and there
is no mention of promoting and safeguarding the members in their exercise
of the profession of pharmacy.
But even as some of the Council and staff were busy congratulating themselves
on what they consider to be tough and uncompromising leadership they
were doubtless aware that this matter would not simply go away.
On the following day, I was in a meeting, surrounded by some of pharmacy’s
most eminent and senior personalities; the meeting was joined by Charter
experts — two lawyers and a barrister.
It transpired that not a single rule or regulation could be found anywhere
which could have given some members of the Council the authority to have
done what they did without first securing a 75 per cent majority vote
on the Council and then seeking the permission from the membership through
a special general meeting. As we now know, they secured neither.
Leading counsel opinion is that they have exceeded the scope of their
powers and they had no business or authority in petitioning the Privy
Council in the way that they did.
The Society has been established as a membership organisation for over
160 years and its assets are conservatively worth more than £100,000,000 — surely
the modernisers did not believe that the members would simply idly stand
by and allow them to hand over these considerable assets to the government’s
regulatory agenda?
There is still time to overturn the decision taken by the last Council
meeting, but to do this will require pharmacists to support financially
proceedings in the High Court.
I appeal to all pharmacists to support the SOS campaign. The actions
of the membership could still ensure that we have a professional membership
body that we can be proud of and one that we can pass on to future generations
of pharmacists.
Mark Koziol
Birmingham
The Journal is there to serve the members
From Mr R. Blyth, FRPharmS
In substituting your own headline “Totalitarian and bureaucratic” without
even a question mark in place of my own “Save Our Society” over
my letter (PJ, 3/10 January, p17), you may have inadvertently conveyed
a wrong impression of my view of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society, damaging
my credibility. I attached these words not to the Society, but to the
language accompanying the retention fee form. It was to the language
that I objected.
The main purpose of my letter was to support the work of the Save Our Society
campaign and in particular to indicate how and where to send cheques needed
for the campaign’s legal fees. All that information was omitted from
my letter as published.
I believe it is the duty of our Journal to provide such information to members.
Perhaps the censoring of my letter is evidence of the dictatorial inclinations
of the present Council. But the PJ is there to serve the members, not the dictates
of the Council, and is, as well as being an official organ, an organ of a free
press in a free society.
Robert Blyth
Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire
| |
Mr Blyth’s original letter was not censored; it was abridged
in order to sit within a section of members’ letters relating
to the retention fee form, which we thought was the central point
he was making.
Presumably, Mr Blyth, as a former editor of The Pharmaceutical
Journal, had a similar relationship with the Council of the Royal
Pharmaceutical Society as
the current editor, who is accountable to the Council for the content of The
Journal. However, The Journal has been put under no pressure by the Council
to restrict the reporting of Save Our Society campaign activities.
We have published
several letters from members who object to the Council’s petition to
the Privy Council. We covered the fact that the SOS campaign intends to go
to law
(PJ, 20/27 December 2003, p831) and we also pointed out that it was appealing
for financial donations (PJ, 13 December 2003, p801). We will continue
to report developments as they take place. Pharmacists interested in learning
more about
the SOS campaign
and its appeal can visit its website
at www.saveoursociety.org.uk
— EDITOR
|
|
The
Pharmaceutical Journal
* PDF files on PJ Online require Acrobat
Reader 4 or later.