The High Court of Justice last week (November 25) delivered a judgement against the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC) ordering it to restart an investigation into a pharmacist’s “alleged involvement in a fraudulent scheme for the sale of medication overseas”.
After a hearing on October 22, the court found that the GPhC handled the pharmacist’s case with “gross incompetence and unfairness, to such an extent that [it] felt compelled to order it to undertake the whole process again”.
The GPhC accepted the court’s decision and apologised for its “significant failings”.
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The pharmacist - referred to as R2 - and his brother Mohammed Amier were co-directors of a pharmacy when Amier was referred to the GPhC in March 2020 over the alleged “fraudulent sale of high-value short supply medications overseas”, the court said.
Amier was suspended from the register by a fitness-to-practice (FtP) committee for 12 months in March this year.
But although R2 was also referred to the GPhC in October 2021, he denied the allegations and said he was “not aware of” or “involved in” the fraudulent activities, the court added.
“Grossly incompetent errors”
The FtP committee found “serious irregularities” in the regulator’s handling of R2’s case in March and said that its “sense of justice would be offended” if the investigation into R2 continued, according to the filing.
But the Professional Standards Authority (PSA) – the regulator’s regulator – referred the FtP decision to stay the case due to “abuse of process” to the High Court, the documents said.
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The High Court judgement last week quashed the FtP committee’s decision to bring the case to an end and ordered that the case be remitted for expedited reconsideration by the GPhC.
The regulator submitted that this should mean that an FtP committee order that it pay R2’s costs of £10,750 on the grounds that its handling of the case was “seriously flawed and unreasonable” is also overturned, the filing said.
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But the court found that the GPhC was “wholly to blame for the grossly incompetent errors made in closing [R2’s] case prematurely and then not re-opening it or notifying him it had been re-opened within a reasonable time”.
It also said that R2 was “unfairly deprived…of the opportunity to respond to the evidence and allegations against him”.
It ruled that it is “reasonable and proportionate for the council to pay the costs as assessed by the FtP committee that R2 incurred in defending himself”.
“Most extreme form of injustice”
In a witness statement to the court, R2 described how “disgusted” he was by what was “the most extreme form of injustice and lack of professionalism [he] had experienced in [his] life”, adding that he had “no trust” in the regulator.
The court documents set out that he “resisted the appeal and instead invited the court to uphold…the decision”, although the GPhC did not contest the appeal.
While Justice Lang acknowledged that the reconsideration of the case “will be stressful and difficult for R2”, she said that “expedition will mitigate the burden of the further proceedings”.
“Sorry for significant failings”
GPhC chief enforcement officer and deputy registrar Dionne Spence said that the regulator is “sorry for the significant failings made in this case, particularly [its] communication with the pharmacist involved and the stress this would have caused him”.
“I hope both the profession and the public feel reassured that we have now reached a fair outcome,” she added.
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The GPhC said that it “[accepted] the outcome” of the case, “including the criticism of the way in which the case was dealt with”.
“We are absolutely committed to learning from this and we have already taken action to ensure mistakes such as this do not occur in the future,” Spence added.
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An FtP committee found in March that R2’s brother Amier was forging signatures – including R2’s - and sending fake prescriptions to manufacturers so he could wholesale “high-value” medicines.
He was found to have committed a “litany of dishonesty” and suspended from the register for the maximum period of 12 months, according to the hearing document at the time.
It comes as GPhC chair Gisela Abbam has won an award that celebrates “women breaking barriers” in leadership roles.
