The NPA has warned the NHS that pharmacies could shut up shop on Saturdays unless it gets a new funding deal.

As it gears up for a second ‘day of action’ on Thursday September 19, the NPA is getting tough with the NHS to try and force through a new deal for community pharmacy by encouraging members to take direct action.

And NPA CEO Paul Rees told C+D if pharmacists do vote to introduce work to rule measures, which would include sticking rigidly to a 40-hour a week contract, it could see pharmacies shutting up shop at the weekends, and operating on a Monday-Friday basis.

“What it’s going to mean for a lot of people is that they won’t be opening on Saturdays,” Rees told C+D. “And there has been a gradual decline in opening hours anyway, because the financial catastrophe is so extreme.”

Read More: Paul Rees talks ballots and bargaining with C+D

Beginning w/c 23 September, the ballot will open with a statement that pharmacies are being squeezed to the brink, putting the long-term safety of patients at risk.

It will then ask members if they agree, and if so, would they consider taking four steps that encompass a work to rule approach. These are cutting hours to contracted minimums, withdrawing free deliveries and medicine dispensing packs, and not sharing data with the NHS unless there is a legal requirement to do so.

 

Action before Christmas

 

The ballot will be open for six weeks, asking community pharmacy owners in England, Northern Ireland and Wales.

Any outcome of the ballot will be advisory as the NPA is not a trade union, but it said any action could take place before Christmas.

And on Thursday the NPA will launch its second 'day of action', which will see pharmacists unite to raise awareness of the pressure they are under.

The day will see a combined force of senior pharmacy industry figures deliver a petition of more than 350,000 signatures to Downing Street, including CPE CEO Janet Morrison.

The NPA will also provide stickers that say “we’re dispensing medicines at a loss” for pharmacies to place on prescription bags.

Everything will build on the first day of action – where stunts included pharmacy teams wearing all black, pharmacies turning their lights off between 9am and noon and blacking out windows.

Previously, the NPA suggested that the September protest could see pharmacies sound an alarm by testing their alarm system at a set coordinated time.

C+D asked CPE for its opinion of Thursday’s activities.

In a statement, Janet Morrison said: “Relentless funding constraints and rising costs have put community pharmacies in a desperate and impossible position. Like everyone in the sector, we are in favour of anything that helps to make this case, and we have been clear about the situation in all our meetings with and submissions to the new Government and the NHS.

Read more: CPE ‘expecting’ delayed pharmacy contract negotiations to ‘resume soon’

“We recognise that many business owners and their teams and other national organisations want to do their bit to make the case for community pharmacy. The more voices we have making the same case for pharmacy the better, and where we can, we and LPCs will continue to work collaboratively with all of them: our doors are always open.

“Pharmacy owners can choose which campaigns and activities they wish to actively support. Community Pharmacy England and LPCs will continue to work with everyone where they can, for the greater good of community pharmacy.

“Community Pharmacy England discusses tactics and positioning on an ongoing basis with regard to what will best support negotiations. We will be interested to hear about the outcomes of this ballot to inform those considerations.”