Pharmacists to lead $10m independent pharmacy watchdog

The Pharmacy Business Ownership Council was meant to be made up of law, accounting and business management experts. Instead, it is 90% community pharmacy.

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Nine out of 10 seats on Queensland’s new Pharmacy Business Ownership Council will be taken by practicing pharmacists, despite promises that the new independent regulator would represent experts from multiple backgrounds.

The creation of the council, which now has powers to issue, change, suspend and cancel pharmacy business licences, was strongly opposed by the Productivity Commission, the RACGP and the AMA.

It is projected to cost Queensland taxpayers around $9.8 million over four years to set up, with the intention that its operating costs beyond that point be met from fees paid by pharmacy owners.

Announced yesterday, the 10 council appointees include four pharmacy owners, five registered pharmacists and one chartered accountant.

Pharmacy owners are required to be registered pharmacists themselves, meaning that nine members of the council are pharmacists.

One of the registered pharmacists is also a law clerk, and – according to Queensland Health – one of the pharmacy owner members has “a strong background in business and financial management”.

AMA Queensland president Dr Nick Yim questioned whether this lined up with the vision for the council outlined in the Pharmacy Business Ownership Act 2024 itself.

Under division 3 of the Act the council must consist of at least five members recommended by the Health Minister, one of whom must be a pharmacy owner and one of whom must be an employee pharmacist.

Non-pharmacists with qualifications or experience in either accounting, business, financial management, law or the day-to-day running of a pharmacy business can make up the balance of the membership.

“All members appointed to the council bar one have conflicts of interest as pharmacists or pharmacy owners,” Dr Yim said.

“This council is unnecessary, anticompetitive and expensive, and has been established against the advice of the federal and Queensland Productivity Commissions, the Queensland Aboriginal and Islander Heath Council, the RACGP and AMA Queensland.”

Dr Yim, a pharmacist-turned-doctor himself, said Queensland already had the most anti-competitive pharmacy ownership laws in the nation and pointed out that no less than 12 publications and research articles have called for pharmacy location and ownership reform over the last 25 years.

“Where is the community representative?” he said.

“Where are the independent law and business management members? Where is the health economist?

“Even worse, the Government is making taxpayers foot the bill for the council for the foreseeable future.”

Queensland Health Minister Shannon Fentiman, for her part, said the government had done extensive consultation with stakeholders including the Pharmacy Guild and the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia and was “proud to establish the council”.

“The Act aims to ensure that pharmacy businesses are operated in a manner that prioritises quality services and high standards of professional practice,” she said.

“This new council will enforce the pharmacy business ownership legislation, which aligns with how pharmacy ownership is regulated in other states and territories.”