Lower pharmacists' payments deferred

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern confirmed that the Health Service Executive (HSE) has deferred the introduction of reduced payments to pharmacists for the supply of medicines to medical card patients, removing the immediate threat to cardholders.

Mr Ahern said that considerable progress had been made in the dispute and the deferral would take the pressure off, so that a mechanism could be reached to establish the community pharmacy contract. New rates were due to be implemented on December 1st and the Irish Pharmaceutical Union had threatened to withdraw from the scheme if they went ahead.

However, HSE chief executive Brendan Drumm last week told the Oireachtas health committee that every month the new pay rate was delayed would cost €8 million.

Labour leader Eamon Gilmore welcomed the deferral, but said the Competition Act was being interpreted in such a way that it was "dogma gone mad". He claimed common sense was being "thrown out the window" in the dispute and it was "absurd that a body such as the HSE cannot meet the Irish Pharmaceutical Union and directly work out the pricing arrangements".

In the same way, "actors who do voiceovers for advertisements cannot have their fees negotiated by Irish Actors Equity. That is ludicrous." He added that "the situation with pharmacists at the moment is that the two sides cannot talk to each other directly, so they must each separately send a representative into a room with Bill Shipsey SC and talk through him. It is nonsense."

Mr Ahern agreed it was "unsatisfactory" and the difficulty with the Competition Act "is that the case was being put forward that to allow cartels or any group of people to fix their prices and arrangements was to prevent proper competition" He had asked the Attorney General to "find a system that is legally sustainable", because it was "unsatisfactory that a representative body cannot talk to whom it would see as its people".