Health Care

If you're not a member but you're thinking of joining, download our pharmacy recruitment leaflet (PDF format) here: Link to a document on this siteWhy pharmacy staff should join UNISON
and then download a membership form at: Join UNISON

Pharmacy staff

UNISON membership in pharmacy is growing. UNISON represents every group of pharmacy staff - pharmacy assistants, pharmacy technicians, pharmacists and all grades of other support and managerial staff.

Pharmacy staff face a rapidly changing future. Enormous changes to their roles are taking place for each type of staff. The value of pharmacists has grown and as their role has grown and extended, so has the role of pharmacy technicians whose extended role has become crucial to the NHS. In turn, some parts of the technician's role is being undertaken by growing numbers of pharmacy assistants.

At the same time, the traditional hospital setting is becoming far more diverse as Primary Care Trusts in England employ many more pharmacists.

The issues facing staff are multiple:

Pay

Pay, especially for pharmacy technicians, pharmacy assistants and the lower grades of pharmacists, is poor. At the top end of the scales senior pharmacists are underpaid compared to equivalent jobs in the private sector. It remains to be seen how the implementation of Agenda for Change resolves these problems.

Information about the current pay scales for pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and assistants is available on the DoH website:
Link to an external websitepay scales for pharmacists
Link to an external websitepharmacy technicians and assistants

If you want to get the latest update on the Agenda for Change pay talks see UNISON's section Link to another page on this sitewww.unison.org.uk/healthcare/a4c/

If you want to follow developments on the 2003-2004 pay claims for pharmacy staff see our document on non-Pay Review Body recommendations (PDF file) Link to a document on this sitewww.unison.org.uk/acrobat/B552.pdf.

Discrimination

First returns on the UNISON 2002 pharmacy survey are showing major concerns over the treatment of women staff. To quote the very first one opened: "In our Trust, careers leave is unavailable and annual leave has to be used, professional development is limited for part-time staff, access to the extended role for technicians is more difficult for part-time staff."

This will be no surprise to UNISON members in pharmacy. You should note that all NHS Trust pharmacy departments are supposed to be implementing a raft of equal opportunity policies. Some of these for England are set out in the DoH Pharmacy Improving Working Lives Toolkit at Link to an external websitewww.doh.gov.uk/iwl.

If you have good practice in your department - or bad practice - let us know.

Registration of pharmacy assistants

State registration of technicians is welcome and overdue, but the process must be one that recognises such staff as equal partners, not as subsidiary assistants. The Association of Pharmacy Technicians website at Link to an external websitewww.aptuk.org carries updates on state registration.

Workloads

There is a serious shortage of pharmacists and pharmacy technicians and it is affecting your workloads and stress levels. Recent surveys and policy papers have looked in detail at the current pharmacy workforce, what the future workforce is likely to look like and the scale of the likely shortfall. To get useful background information on these issues download the DoH report "Pharmacy in the Future: Implementing the NHS Plan" from Link to an external websitewww.doh.gov.uk/pharmacy/workforcediscussion.
CONTACT DETAILS
• For urgent help and advice at work to go Help at work
• Karen Jennings is the head of the UNISON Healthcare team:
UNISON Healthcare
1 Mabledon Place
London WC1H 9AJ
Email: health@unison.co.uk
Health pay matters
Recent documents