Indemnity requirement put on hold for new Order
Requirements for pharmacists and pharmacy technicians to hold appropriate indemnity cover for professional negligence will not be introduced at the same time as other professional reforms set out in the Pharmacists and Pharmacy Technicians Order 2007 (the Section 60 order).
Government representatives said during almost identical debates on the
Order in the House
of Commons this week, and the House
of Lords last
week, that implementation would be delayed while discussions were held
with all the regulators of health professionals over the implications
of a court judgment last summer (see Panel below).
Discretionary benefits cast doubt over indemnity
arrangements
The provision of professional indemnity on a discretionary
basis
by the Medical Defence Union means that the Government is delaying
the introduction of compulsory indemnity arrangements for practising
pharmacists and pharmacy technicians while it discusses the matter
with health regulators.
Last summer it emerged that the MDU declined to provide cover
for 71 of 74 claims faced by a dentist member. The dentist’s membership
of the MDU satisfied the General Dental Council’s requirement
that dentists should be members of a defence society or have some
other form of indemnity against claims of professional negligence.
One of the dentist’s patients unsuccessfully sought judicial
review of the MDU’s decision not to provide indemnity.
Both John D’Arcy of the Chemists Defence Association and
John Murphy of the Pharmacists Defence Association said that professional
negligence cover for pharmacies and pharmacists is not a discretionary
benefit of membership of their organisations. |
Following the debates, and its acceptance in the House of Lords, the
Order remained to be formally accepted by the House of Commons as The
Journal went to press. It is expected to come into force later this month.
Both debates questioned the power given in the Order to the Privy Council
to vary the make-up of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s Council
other than following a request from the Society endorsed by a special
resolution, as set out in the Society’s Royal Charter.
In the Commons, shadow health minister Stephen O’Brien (Con, Eddisbury)
asked why this power was being taken.
Health minister Caroline Flint said that it was there in order to ensure
consistency in the provisions relating to the various regulators of the
health professions. It was unlikely that the power would ever be used.
Mr O’Brien (Con, Eddisbury) also wanted to know why the Government
had rejected the Society’s concern that the Order required it to
tell employers and the UK health departments that a registrant’s
fitness to practise was under investigation. He was concerned about the
implications for people about whom false or malicious allegations might
be made.
Health minister Caroline Flint said that the Society’s Registrar
would weed out such cases before they were referred to the new Investigating
Committee [which will replace the current Infringements Committee and
will decide whether cases should be referred to the new Disciplinary
Committee or the new Health Committee]. Disclosure would only be required
after referral. Having had that check, it could only be right that appropriate
individuals should know a case is to be investigated, she said.
In the Lords, Government health spokeswoman Baroness Royall said that
disclosure was a tried and tested approach used by other regulators that
represented an appropriate balance between a registrant’s privacy
and the need to protect the public.
Pharmacist MP Sandra Gidley (LibDem, Romsey) was concerned that the outcome
of the Foster review of non-medical regulation could be either the splitting
of the Society or a lay majority on the Council, which also has responsibility
for professional leadership. She wanted to know what would happen if
the Society maintained its dual role and the outcome of the review resulted
in a lay majority imposed by the Privy Council. She said that some members
of the Society considered that this could not be in the interests of
professional leadership.
Mrs Flint said that most of the Society’s members wanted to retain
a statutory link between registration and membership of the Society,
but the review had recommended separation of the dual functions. This
would be addressed in the forthcoming White Paper on future regulation.
But she warned: “We need to get this right in relation to public
protection as opposed to professional representation.” |
The
Pharmaceutical Journal
Acrobat
Reader