To ask the Minister of Health whether his Department has considered adopting the Scottish model for claw-back adjustments to provide financial stability for community pharmacies in Northern Ireland, given the reported £24 million reduction in pharmacy budgets due to the claw-back in 2023-24.

The community funding models in each of the UK nations differs; in terms of government funding for community pharmacies per head of population (2023-2024), Northern Ireland is 22% higher than Scotland.

In Northern Ireland, the opening envelope for 24/25 was £147m; this represented an increase of £19m on 23/24 opening envelope, an increase of 14.8%, not a decrease in funding as detailed in the question.

As part of the community pharmacy reimbursement arrangements, discount clawback has been used for many years in NI, England, Wales, and Scotland to reduce reimbursement in recognition that pharmacies are receiving additional profit through their efficient procurement.

Following a consultation completed in March 2022 on proposals to reform aspects of the NI Drug Tariff, including review of discount clawback scales, revised discounting arrangements were introduced on a phased basis from January 2024. These arrangements aim to ensure that clawback is more appropriately applied to pharmacy contractors, whilst maintaining cost neutrality, and are being introduced over an 18-month period to minimise any impact on contractors. In the first 11 months of these transitional arrangements, over £1.42m less has been clawed back from pharmacy contractors under the new arrangements than legacy arrangements, and my Department remains committed to monitoring the impact of these new arrangements on all contractors and to taking actions as needed.