Election of new Council begins
The process for electing the reformed Council of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society has begun with the publication of a call
for nominations in this issue of The Journal (p31).
Because the election regulations have had to be regazetted under the
new Charter (PJ, 11 December 2004, p863), the call for nominations is
being made on a conditional basis, since the election regulations will
not be approved before February.
This year’s election is taking place about a month earlier than
usual to ease the hand-over of power to the new Council. The closing
date for nominations is 25 February, the voting papers will be sent out
early in March and the closing date for voting will be 11 April. The
results will be published in The Journal of 16 April but the new Council
will not take office until 25 May — the day after the Society’s
annual general meeting for 2005.
The five-week overlap is to help the new Council find its feet, because
a significant proportion of the new Council will have no Council experience.
At least seven of the 10 appointed lay members will be new to the Council,
as will the two elected pharmacy technicians and the appointed academic
pharmacist. And with the number of elected pharmacists cut from 21 to
17, at least four current pharmacist members will be leaving the Council
and — in theory, at least — all 21 could do so.
The two pharmacy technician members of Council will be elected from,
and by, those on the Society's voluntary register of technicians. The
Society is encouraging technicians who are interested in standing for
the Council to apply to join the register as soon as possible. This year,
pharmacy technician candidates will be self-nominated but in future elections,
a pharmacy technician candidate will need to be nominated by five other
technicians.
The President, Nicholas Wood, said: “I hope that where appropriate,
pharmacists will play their part by encouraging their technician colleagues
to consider putting themselves forward for election.”
Serving on the Council, p28
The election process, p29
Official
Notices, p31
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The
Pharmaceutical Journal