Council finalises the composition of the national pharmacy boards
The final composition of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society's three national pharmacy boards was agreed by the Society's Council at its February
Council meeting, when it approved the composition of the English Pharmacy Board and revised some earlier decisions relating to the Scottish and Welsh boards.
One of the Council’s main decisions is that the English Pharmacy
Board, unlike the Scottish and Welsh boards, will include sectoral representation.
The Council also agreed that, although voting in elections to the board
will be restricted to pharmacists with registered addresses in England,
board members will only be required either to live or to work in England.
Another decision is that the English and Scottish boards will not include
a registered pharmacy technician but the Welsh board will have a pharmacy
technician member will full voting rights. The decisions in relation
to Scotland and Wales reflect the wishes of the Society’s Scottish
and Welsh executives, which the new boards will succeed.
Apart from the decision not to include a technician on the board, the
Council’s decision relating to the English board were made on the
recommendation of a third meeting of a group of Council members to consider
the composition of the English board. The failure of two earlier meetings
to reach a consensus had prevented the Council from agreeing a constitution
in December 2005, when it had agreed compositions for the Scottish
and Welsh boards (PJ, 17 December 2005, p757).
The Council accepted 16 recommendation for the composition of the English
board, as follows:
· The Council should encourage the board to review its composition at
or before the end of its first term and propose any changes it believes
would be desirable
· Candidates for board membership should be registered in Britain and
should live or work in England; nominators and voters in board elections
should have registered addresses in England
· Council members should be eligible to stand for election to the board
· Pharmacists on the non-practising register should not be eligible for
election to the board
· Members of the board should have no limit on consecutive terms of office
· The chief pharmacist at the Department of Health may be invited to
attend specific board meetings
· Branch observers should be invited to attend board meetings
· The Council member elected in the Council’s English constituency
should be a full voting member of the board as of right
· The Council should appoint one other pharmacist member living or working
in England to the board as a full voting member
· The Council should appoint one of its lay members living or working
in England to the board as a full voting member
· The board should not have places reserved for the regions
· The following four sectors should have one elected place each as of
right on the board, for pharmacists living or working in England: community,
hospital, industrial, academia
· Another sectoral place should be reserved as of right for either a
primary care pharmacist or a public health specialist living or working
in England
· In addition to the five sectoral places, there should be seven elected
places on the board for pharmacists living or working in England
· Candidates for election to the board should self-nominate (supplying
a brief curriculum vitae and policy statement) and have the support of
10 pharmacists registered in England
· The voting system for electing board members should be a “first
past the post” election with constraints
Speaking after the Council meeting, the President, Hemant Patel, said: “The
Council has agreed to devolve greater powers to the national boards and
following the Council meeting we are now in a strong position to move
forward towards implementation. This is an exciting time for pharmacy
with devolution offering many challenges and opportunities. The new boards
will help the Society, and the profession as whole, take advantage of
these opportunities and take pharmacy into the future.”
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The
Pharmaceutical Journal