Under the new legislation which came into effect on1st October 2012, the Pharmaceutical Society NI and the Registrar are legally obliged to make available to the public, employers and other pharmacists, a registrant’s fitness to practise status.
To enable the enactment of the legislation the organisation, at the Council meeting on the 2nd Oct 2012, adopted an interim disclosure policy, whilst a formal policy is developed, published and consulted upon.
This is very important to both members of the public and registrants, as for the first time, a registrants fitness to practise status will be annotated to their entry on the publicly available register.
The interim policy outlines in what format and for how long fitness to practise information will be available and sets out details of who will be formally notified of a fitness to practise issue regarding a pharmacist.
All stakeholders, particularly pharmacists and employers need to be aware of this change and that this information will now be in the public domain and will remain there for a specified period of time.
In early 2013 the organisation intends to publish its formal policy on disclosure and this will be subject to a formal consultation process. We will be seeking views on how the online register should display historic fitness to practise information in terms of content and duration and the disclosure of fitness to practise information to third parties.
We encourage everyone to familiarise themselves with the current policy and to engage proactively in the development and consultation on the formal policy once it is made available.