Council urged to make BPC attendance affordable
The Council of the Society should take measures to ensure that attendance at the British Pharmaceutical Conference is both affordable and attractive, the branch
representatives' meeting decided.
Jan Basey (Manchester, Salford and Trafford) said that the annual conference
was an opportunity for the Society to engage with the grass roots of
the profession. But experience suggested that conference attendance comprised
mainly academic staff and students funded by their institutions, senior
managers from community pharmacy chains funded by their employers and
a few senior managers from hospitals and primary care trusts again funded
by the NHS. Miss Basey added that she had attended the conference six
times and had yet to meet a self-funding attender.
Even the reduced “early bird” fee and the cheapest accommodation
available were beyond the means of many junior pharmacists. And the £250
allowance for a first-time conference attender was enough
for perhaps one day of the BPC and the associated travel costs.
The Council should pursue all opportunities to secure adequate sponsorship
for the conference. It should perhaps hold the conference over a weekend
period, thus limiting the amount of locum fees to be paid and limit the
amount of leave taken by those who wish to attend. It should review the
policy on grants for first-time attenders. It consider arranging the
conference programme so as perhaps to attract different groups on different
days.
Seconding, Geoffrey Benson (Manchester, Salford and Trafford) said that
in the early years of his career, and for some 30 years, thereafter he
had been fortunate to attend the BPC annually. During those years it
appeared that pharmacists from all sectors of the profession, many of
them recently qualified, attended at their own expense. Meeting and talking
to them was at least as useful as attending the arranged programme. From
the comments made within the branch, many young pharmacists who would
like to attend the conference cannot afford to do so. The conference
no longer provides an opportunity for the grass roots of the profession
to convene and share their knowledge and experience.
The branch urged the Council to investigate all possible ways to ensure
that the BPC is both affordable and attractive to the average self-funding
pharmacist.
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