Community Pharmacies — House of Commons, 2016-11-02
Topic: Health
Luciana Clare Goldsmith (Berger) (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman has just spoken in support of the Opposition motion When we had an urgent question on this subject, I listened closely to the Minister, who talked particularly about how far he expected people to travel and said that lots of community pharmacies were not very busy. Over recent weeks, I have made a point of looking through the windows of my local community pharmacies to see whether any of them are in fact empty, and it is fair to say that none of them are at any point. The statistics show how busy our local community pharmacies actually are. The figures speak for themselves. The average community pharmacy sees, on average, 137 people every single day. They dispense 87,000 prescription items over the course of a year. They support, on average, 250 people with diabetes, 389 people with asthma, 463 unpaid carers, 805 older people, 1,317 with a mental health condition, and 1,416 people discharged from hospital. The last figure is particularly important. I will not presuppose what the Health Committee report that comes out tomorrow might say about pressures on our winter A&E services, but it is fair to say that many people are expecting, following a summer crisis in the A&Es in our hospitals, that our local hospital services will be under enormous amounts of pressure. Our community pharmacies already do a really important job in supporting our constituents who have been discharged from hospital I have had the opportunity to listen to members of my local pharmaceutical committee. When I asked them what the local stats and figures were so that I was equipped for this debate, I was very struck by what they said. Hon. Members have already mentioned to the Minister—it is regrettable that he is no longer in his place—the pharmacy assessment scheme and how it has been put together. It is enormously regrettable, to put it politely, that it does not take account of deprivation. That means that the pharmacies in the most deprived areas of our country, where patients have greater health needs, are not entitled to claim the payment. I made this point earlier, and I make it again: in Liverpool, we have some of the highest levels of deprivation; Kensington ward is in the top 20 in the country. No pharmacies in my constituency are eligible for the pharmacy assessment scheme payment, and just two across the whole of Liverpool are eligible—one in Croxteth and one in Netherley. That means that all the other 129 community pharmacies across Liverpool, and six distance-selling pharmacies, face the full funding cut. That puts at risk the very vital service that they offer to my constituents and people across Liverpool The funding cut in this financial year has already had an impact on our local pharmacies. Some have already curtailed their free, but unfunded, delivery service to patients. My hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East highlighted the hours in which those services are often provided. They are a lifeline for house-bound and vulnerable patients across our country Other pharmacies are already in the process of making staff redundant, so they will have to survive on fewer staff. Pharmacists in some of our community pharmacies will, therefore, inevitably be tied more to the dispensing bench rather than undertaking the enhanced clinical role that NHS England, the Department of Health and Ministers expect them to deliver under the five year forward view The point about deprivation is so important. As my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) said in his important opening remarks, it is outrageous that the pharmacy assessment scheme will further widen health inequalities in our country. We will have a specific debate about that issue next Tuesday, so I ask the Minister to reflect on it. In 2016, we have a responsibility to close the gap, not promote schemes that will widen it. I note in particular that the scheme makes no provision for patients and communities with protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010 I know that many other hon. Members wish to speak, so I will make a very brief point in the 13 seconds that I have left. Some Members, including the Minister, keep calling community pharmacies "private enterprises," but there are many co-operatives that provide these services, often in rural and isolated areas across the country.