Government retains bar on foreign-trained pharmacists

The Government has stepped back from an immediate move to scrap rules that prevent pharmacists not trained in the Republic from opening new chemist shops.

After a last-minute change in plans to reform the pharmacy sector, the rule will not now be scrapped in legislation to introduce a new fitness-to-practise regime in the sector.

According to sources, a separate piece of legislation to scrap the rule will be prepared after the forthcoming Pharmacy Bill is enacted.

This two-phased approach will delay the removal of a barrier to trade on foreign-trained pharmacists, which has drawn criticism from the OECD.

It is contrary to the provisions outlined in the original Cabinet memorandum on the subject, which proposed that both measures will be included in the same legislative package.

It was unclear last night why the Cabinet decided against the original approach, which was embraced in a memorandum prepared in February.

It was also unclear when the Government intends to prepare a second Bill.

With the summer recess of the Dáil imminent, the first Bill could take as long as a year to be passed into law by the Oireachtas.

Thus, the barrier to trade on foreign-trained pharmacists, including Irish pharmacists who trained abroad, will remain in place.

The restriction comes from a derogation from a European Union directive which had the effect of preventing foreign-trained pharmacists from owning, managing or supervising a pharmacy that is less than three years old.

It is one of the last remaining barriers to trade in the sector, following the liberalising of the pharmacy industry three years ago by the Government, which removed limits on the number of State contracts to distribute drugs that can be operated in particular areas.

The fitness-to-practise regime will include provisions that will impose new costs on pharmacy businesses.

It will require them to be registered with the Pharmaceutical Society.

Only pharmacists are registered in the current system. The money raised will be used to fund an inspectorate managed by the society, which will have powers to penalise pharmacies who break its rules.

The effort to reform the sector comes more than two years after the Government received the report of the Pharmacy Review Group.