LOCAL PHARMACISTS

Motion Text

That this House notes that community pharmacists offer their local communities convenient access to NHS services; recognises their role in reducing the burden on local general practitioners; notes the recommendations of the Office of Fair Trading that pharmaceutical dispensing should be made open to free market competition; is concerned that supermarkets would use their market power to undermine and eliminate small local pharmacies and thereby effect a net loss of NHS provision; and urges Her Majesty's Government not to accept this recommendation of the OFT.