The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 274 No 7352 p685
4 June 2005

Society summary

No major workload has arisen from declaration on retention fee form

No major workload has arisen from the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s new requirement that members must declare on the retention fee form any convictions, cautions, letters of warning and proceedings and findings from other regulatory bodies that could impact upon their fitness to practise.

Answering a question at the Society’s annual general meeting on 24 May, Mandie Lavin, director of fitness to practise and legal affairs, said that a total of 45 declarations had been made on the form this year. All the cases had now been concluded, with the exception of a few individuals who had registered after the issue of the statutory notice. The infringements were mainly of a minor nature, such as fishing without a licence, minor television violations and parking offences. In terms of resources, no additional meetings of the Infringements Committee had been needed to deal with these cases.

Ms Lavin said that the exercise of requiring those registering with the Society to make a declaration was in line with the Society’s role as protector of the public. Indeed, in a performance review the Council for Healthcare Regulatory Excellence had commented on the fact that the Society performed this exercise, and many other health care regulators had copied the Society’s wording.

Ms Lavin made her statement in reply to a question raised by John Murphy, who raised the case of a pharmacist who had had a minor traffic misdemeanour some 32 years ago, for which she was fined £25. Being a conscientious pharmacist, she had declared the offence and had been referred to the Infringements Committee. She had been bound to declare the referral to her employer, who had said that the referral might affect her application for a more senior job.

Mr Murphy said that it was a matter of public record that 43 per cent of the adult population had convictions for speeding, which meant that about 20,000 pharmacists had such a conviction. He asked why the Society was causing hardworking, honest, competent and well-respected pharmacists the anguish and worry about the possible implications of declaring these minor offences.

David Thomas (Thames Valley) pointed out that the declaration related only to matters “that could impact upon fitness to practise”. If he had been convicted 32 years ago for a minor traffic offence he would not have declared it because it would have no impact on his fitness to practise.