Health Bill

In speaking to the amendment I shall also speak to Amendments Nos. 88 and 89, which are grouped with it. I share many of the noble Earl’s concerns. I have looked at this clause several times in an effort to understand why it is necessary. I can see that a primary care trust might wish to make a decision between competing applications for a pharmacy service, and that it may seek to do so on the basis of provision of enhanced services to communities. I cannot then understand how the wording of Clause 34 enables it to do that. The clause reads as though it is the sort of intrusion into pricing policies that the noble Earl, Lord Howe, mentioned. In the field of pharmacy services, where there are known big chains with much greater purchasing power than small operators, it is a concern that there could be unfair bidding. I am concerned about protecting pharmacy services that exist in areas of high deprivation, which are often provided by sole practitioners and sole owners, often people who come from particular communities and have the ability to help with the general interface with the NHS in a way that large providers do not. It would be wrong if they were to be seriously disadvantaged because of an inability to compete on pricing for over-the-counter medicines. It is for those reasons that I have tabled Amendments Nos. 88 and 89.