GENERAL PROVISIONS (Hansard, 18 October 1968)

§ The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Bruce Millan)
I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker
It will be appropriate to take at the same time Amendment No. 92.

§ Mr. Millan
The object of these Amendments is to provide that in Scotland, where there are partnerships between pharmacists and non-pharmacists it should be possible for them to become persons lawfully conducting a retail pharmacy business provided that the pharmacist partner or another pharmacist is in personal control of the business. Clause 62(1)(a), as it now stands, requires each of the partners to be a pharmacist.
In Scotland, however, there are at least 70 firms with premises registered under the Pharmacy and Poisons Act, 1933, where there is a partnership between pharmacist and non-pharmacist. Many of these are family partnerships of husband and wife or other relatives. If these Amendments were not to be made all these partnerships would require to be dissolved or converted into bodies corporate.
The Amendment to Clause 62(1)(a) provides that in Scotland one or more of the partners shall be a pharmacist. The effect of the Amendment to Clause 63 is that in Scotland the business, so far as it concerns the retail sale of medicinal products, must be under the personal control of one or more of the partners who is a pharmacist or that of another pharmacist.