§ 31 and 44. Mr. GODFREY LOCKER-LAMPSONasked (1) if the proprietor of a drug store who has been in business for six years and previous to that was dispenser to a doctor for nearly ten years, whilst before that he was dispensing for three years to another doctor, is debarred from dispensing under the National Insurance Act, even in the case of prescriptions which do not contain scheduled poisons, although entitled to do so for private persons, while he may sell loose the drugs in the prescriptions; and what steps, if any, are to be taken to alter this condition of things, having regard to the 2181 pledge of the Chancellor of the Exchequer of the 2nd August, 1911; and (2) if a man who has been a doctor's dispenser for six or ten years, but was running a drug store or store pharmacy for some time immediately prior to the passing of the National Insurance Act, is debarred from appointments under the Act open to a man of less experience who was a doctor's dispenser for three years immediately prior to the passing of the Act?
33 Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANSasked (1) if holders of the dispensers' certificate of the Society of Apothecaries at the time the National Insurance Act passed, but who were then unemployed, are debarred from dispensing under the Act; (2) whether, having regard to the inability of the Commissioners to make regulations to remove the disabilities imposed on many dispensers who are debarred from dispensing under the National Insurance Act, it is proposed to introduce amending legislation to give effect to the pledge of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, given on 2nd August, 1911, that no one who was entitled to dispense should be cut out and that those already carrying on business should be protected; and (3) whether qualified apothecaries' assistants, whose qualification is accepted by the Local Government Board, the Metropolitan Asylums Board, and His Majesty's prisons, are allowed to go on the panel for dispensing under the National Insurance Act?
§ 100 Mr. CASSELasked (1) if a dispenser who has been for twenty-three years in his present situation, was previously regularly apprenticed to a chemist, has been engaged in the business of dispenser for thirty-three years and has dispensed many thousand prescriptions, and whose employers are now dissolving partnership, is debarred from being a registered dispenser under the National Insurance Act, while men who dispensed for doctors for only three years immediately prior to the passing of the Act are qualified; and, if so, what steps it is proposed to take to fulfil the promise that no one who was qualified to dispense before the Act would be cut out; (2) if a man who served a full apprenticeship to a dispensing chemist and has been an assistant to dispensing chemists in various parts of the country, was in 1885 dispenser to an important hospital, from 1893 to 1896 to a medical practitioner, and since then has been daily dispensing doctors' prescriptions behind a chemist's counter, and has 2182 had twenty-five years' varied experience in dispensing, is debarred from doing so under the National Insurance Act, notwithstanding the promise that no one qualified to dispense before the Act would be cut out by the Act; (3) if the rights of a certified assistant to an apothecary, preserved in Section 15 (5) (iv.) of the National Insurance Act, are subservient to the dispensing rights of licentiates of the Society of Apothecaries which are not preserved by the Act; if apothecaries' assistants have, from 1815, been acting as dispensers in hospitals, asylumns, infirmaries, and dispensaries, and to medical men without supervision; and will measures be taken to prevent men who have passed a lifetime as dispensers without supervision, but who, under the Act, can only dispense under the supervision of a registered pharmacist, from having their livelihood imperilled; and (4) if the Financial Secretary to the Treasury can suggest any means whereby those bonâ-fide chemists who fulfil the conditions of Clause 3 (3) of the Medicine Stamp Act and are qualified to compound and dispense known, admitted, and approved formulas, and have acted as dispensary assistants or managers to chemists and druggists, and also all dispensers of three years' standing to doctors and public institutions, may submit their claims to dispense under the National Insurance Act either through the London and Provincial Druggists' Association or direct to the Insurance Commissioners, with suitable provisions for dealing with any objection to any name in a manner which will satisfy the association?
§ Mr. MASTERMANBy Clause 15 (5) (3) the Insurance Act prohibits arrangements being made for the dispensing of medicines with persons other than persons, firms, or bodies corporate entitled to carry on the business of a chemist and druggist under the provisions of the Pharmacy Acts, 1868 and 1908. Unqualified persons who for three years immediately prior to the passing of the Act have acted as dispensers to duly qualified medical practitioners or to public institutions have a right under the Act to dispense in the service of such persons, firms, or bodies corporate, with the same rights and limitations as those existing before the passing of the Act. This Clause was deliberately approved by the House after a full Debate and without a Division. On an Amendment proposing to extend such a right to dispense to persons qualified under the Apothecaries Act 2183 of 1815, my right hon. Friend promised that no one who was qualified to dispense before the passing of the Act should be cut out of the Act; and a Sub-section protecting the interests of these persons was inserted on the Report stage. The Commissioners have no power to alter this decision of Parliament; nor have I any evidence at present that Parliament desires (apart from the possibility of meeting special cases of hardship) that dispensing under the Act should be generally done by unqualified persons.
Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANSIs the right hon. Gentleman aware that the undertaking of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, given on 2nd October, was not carried out in the Amendment made on the Report stage?
§ Mr. MASTERMANI think it was carried out. I looked up the Debate to-day. It was in a specific Amendment, and my right hon. Friend promised that no one who was qualified to dispense before the Act should be cut out by the Act.
§ Mr. O'GRADYIs it not a fact that these men referred to in the question were qualified to dispense, and did dispense, for doctors for a considerable number of years, that the result of the Act has been to create a monopoly of pharmaceutical chemists, that these men are suffering in their business, many of them going into bankruptcy, and that this is fast becoming public scandal?
§ Mr. MASTERMANI do not think these gentlemen were qualified to dispense except under the surpervision of a medical man, but I would submit that the whole question would be a better subject of discussion than for question and answer.