The new pharmacy contract in England lays the foundations to build on for the future, former Community Pharmacy Scotland (CPS) negotiator Harry McQuillan has suggested.

But the chair of Numark acknowledged that the new contract would not meet the costs hoped for by contractors who were really struggling.

In an interview with The Pharmacist, Mr McQuillan said that in his experience of negotiations, the 'best possible' total funding envelope would be agreed before working out how best to spend it.

'That'll have been a pharmacy owner/contractor and government decision,' he said.

The 2025/26 Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework includes a £3.073bn global sum, which includes increasing the medicines margin to £900m and the single activity fee (SAF) by 19p.

A further £215m will be available for contractors to earn through Pharmacy First, blood pressure and contraception services, while a national emergency hormonal contraception service has been commissioned.

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The new pharmacy contract equates to an average of around £65,200 additional income per pharmacy in England for 2025/26, Community Pharmacy England has suggested.

Mr McQuillan said that the 'significant' increase in the single activity fee indicated that 'supply is still very, very important'.

'They are putting an element of the funding into making sure that essential core service remains,' he told The Pharmacist.

And in line with the 'strategic intent for the network' and the government's focus on prevention and community care, clinical services had been bundled together, he noted.

This will eventually require pharmacies to offer blood pressure and contraception services alongside Pharmacy First each month. 

For the public, it 'doesn't matter what pharmacy to go into, I'm going to get all these services and for me, I think that's critical for the network', he said.

'In Scotland [we've] definitely seen a shift there, from the GP being the first port of call to, "let's go to the pharmacy",' he said.

The new variable payment thresholds for Pharmacy First outlined in the new contract would also 'help the public get access to services, pharmacies stay engaged, and it makes sure all the funding gets paid out'.

Keeping pharmacies engaged in the service was 'really important' from a strategic perspective, Mr McQuillan said, 'because then you walk into any pharmacy and you still receive Pharmacy First'.

The more comfortable patients and pharmacists were with this type of clinical service, the easier it would be to introduce prescribing services as the new wave of graduate prescribers enters the workforce, Mr McQuillan said.

The write-off of £193m of historic medicines margin over-delivery in the new pharmacy contract was also a 'real win for the network', Mr McQuillan added.

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'Although it's not immediate cash, it's not someone taking out of your pocket again,' he said.

And in paying for services delivered in 2024/25, 'what [the government has] not had to do was go and find new money to plug that gap, because the money was already paid out', he said.

'When I was in Scotland, we were in a position where we couldn't pay our bills. This figure kept getting bigger and bigger, and it became the albatross around our neck,' he said.

'There's talk in this [England pharmacy contract] settlement as well about looking at category M and looking at how that margin is distributed. So, I think there seems to be many positive signs,' Mr McQuillan said.

'We can't fix it all in one year. But actually, now that the Labour government's come in... there's certainly positive noises.'

'I don't think they've done a bad job,' he added.

And responding to comments that the deal had been 'mixed' and did not meet the full costs of the economic review, Mr McQuillan suggested the new pharmacy contract deal was a starting point before thinking about 'how do we get to much closer to that figure?'

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He told The Pharmacist that his experience as a negotiator indicated that the government's commitment 'to staying at the table' and 'acknowledgement there's a funding gap' was a positive sign for the sector in England.

And he said the pharmacy minister had made some concessions to the sector that would help engage contractors 'in the new reform the ministers looking for'.

Mr McQuillan was chief executive of negotiating body Community Pharmacy Scotland from 2006 to 2024.