CPE chief executive Janet Morrison said that “committee members were in an almost impossible position” during contract negotiations with the Department of Health and Social Care (DH).
Speaking about today’s (March 31) announcement of the long-awaited pharmacy funding deal for 2025/26 – which represents an 18.6%, or £481 million, increase on 2023/2024 sector funds – the negotiator said that CPE “reluctantly accepted” the offer.
Read more: BREAKING: New 2025 CPCF funding deal - uplift revealed
“On the one hand, this was a settlement offering the highest uplift in the NHS, more than £800 million…in extra funding for pharmacies, supporting core dispensing income and strengthening key services,” Morrison said.
“We were able to influence [this settlement] considerably in pharmacy’s favour through the negotiations to help manage resources and improve equity of access to funding,” she added.
“[But] on the other hand, this uplift is not enough to fully stabilise the sector as evidenced by the economic analysis,” she said.
“Not enough”
CPE acknowledged that “this is the first significant investment in community pharmacy’s core funding for over 10 years”, but stressed that “it is only a first step towards sustainability”.
“The CPE committee therefore reluctantly accepted the final offer – with the very serious caveats that this funding is not enough to meet the full cost of delivery of NHS services as indicated by the independent economic analysis,” it said.
Read more: Health minister Stephen Kinnock on the 2025 funding deal: ‘I know it’s not perfect, but...’
“More needs to be done to put the community pharmacy sector on a sustainable footing,” it added.
But CPE highlighted that “the government has acknowledged the funding gap and [is] committed to working towards a sustainable model for community pharmacy”, adding that “work will continue to ensure that this commitment is met”.
Read more: Economic review reveals half of pharmacies ‘not profitable’
It comes after the economic review of the pharmacy sector, which was finally published last week, found that “around 47% of pharmacies were not profitable in their last accounting year”.
The analysis estimated that the “full economic cost” of providing NHS pharmaceutical services in England was “in the range of £4.397-5.730 billion” in the 12 months to March 31 2024”.
And it concluded that 99% of pharmacies in England are funded at less than this, meaning they are “not sustainable in the long-run”.
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