Andy Burnham Says NO To Pharmacist Recruitment And Retention Premium

The Secretary of State for Health in England says he is happy with current actions being taken by the Department of Health to resolve the recruitment and retention issue of junior pharmacist.

In a Written Ministerial Statement (dated 06/01/10), in response to the Pay Review Body’s suggestion that the Secretary of State for Health in England and the equivalent Health Ministers in the Devolved Administrations reconsider the recommendation made in the PRB’s 24th report to pay a short term RRP to band 6 and 7 pharmacists, the Secretary of State for Health, Andy Burnham, has said he is content that the actions the DH have been taking in England to resolve the recruitment and retention problems with band 6 and 7 pharmacists are the right ones and there is no need to adopt the recommendation to pay a short term RRP. In a written reply to a request from Karen Reay, National Officer for the Health Sector of Unite, to meet and discuss the issue further, he has stated that a further meeting is not warranted at this time.

The Guild are very disappointed that the Secretary of State for Health has turned down this further opportunity to implement the recommendation from the independent PRB and instead chose to rely on measures that at best will not provide a resolution to the problem for at least 2 years, if at all. “Whilst the Guild supports these measures to help in the medium term, the fundamental issue of the pay difference with the private sector will still remain and will affect the ability of the managed sector to retain pre-registration pharmacists,” said Dave Thornton, Chair of Terms and Conditions for GHP. “The measures that are actually being taken in reality to deal with the vacancy problems are service cutbacks and disestablishment of junior pharmacist posts, both of which potentially compromise patient safety and the use of agency staff that cost significantly more than permanent staff to employ. The results from the EQUIP study, in which pharmacists in 19 NHS hospital Trusts in the North West of England identified 11,077 errors in approximately 125,000 prescribed items over a 7 day period, clearly demonstrate the important role pharmacists play in ensuring medicines are used safely in hospital and high vacancy rates impact on our ability to deliver this important safety mechanism. Ministers need to be aware of the risks to patient safety that are being posed by not delivering this short term solution. We are also concerned that the Department of Health still is of the view that the vacancy problem is one of supply and is not related to pay. I would urge all affected parties to send a strong message to the DH that this is indeed a pay issue that could be resolved in the short term through the implementation of the RRP as recommended by the PRB,” he added.