Contractors want legal advice from the PSNC
Pharmacy contractors have called on the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee to give legal advice on service level agreements and contracts.
Proposing a motion to that effect at this week’s local
pharmaceutical committees’ conference in London, Gareth McCague (Leicester LPC)
said that primary ccare trusts were trying to avoid responsibility and
pass all liability for NHS services to contractors. They were requiring
full indemnity for any consequences arising from NHS services and minimum
insurance of £10m.
“These clauses ensure that there are no circumstances whatsoever
where primary care trusts might be liable for harm caused by defective
protocols
that might have been prepared by PCT managers or pharmaceutical advisers,” Mr
McCague said.
He added that Leicester PCT’s pharmaceutical adviser had agreed
that contractors should not be responsible for the acts or omissions
of the PCT but had been over-ruled by a PCT manager.
The motion was carried without dissent.
Concern was also expressed over the prolonged roll-out expected for the
electronic transmission of prescriptions (ETP) from prescribers to pharmacies
and from pharmacies to the Prescription Pricing Authority.
Calling on the PSNC to ensure that ETP was introduced without delay,
Gary Jones (Berkshire LPC) said that the interim paper-based system that
would be required for repeat dispensing was a particularly unappealing
prospect. He was further concerned that some PCTs would not bother with
it, leading to patients having access to repeat dispensing services in
only some areas. This would financially disadvantage their pharmacies
because they would be denied the additional dispensing fees associated
with repeats.
There was no opposition to Mr Jones’s motion.
Other motions accepted by the conference called on the PSNC not to enter
into partnerships with external organisations, such as education providers,
without a transparent tendering process and to try to persuade the Department
of Health to take steps to ensure that prescribers could not direct prescriptions
to pharmacies of their own choice.
PSNC chief executive Sue Sharpe said that these were both PSNC policy.
She added that she believed the DoH to be opposed to prescription direction. |
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