Scotland’s newly elected first minister, John Swinney, has appointed Angela Constance MSP to be cabinet secretary for health and care. 

Pharmacists across Scotland are providing high-quality, person-centred care to patients every day in a variety of settings, including in hospital, GP practices and in community. Pharmacists are an integral part of healthcare in all settings, and we need to maximise the skills and potential of the profession. 

During the election, our manifesto themes focussed on maximising pharmacy for patient benefit. We look forward to working with the cabinet secretary and the rest of the Scottish government, and more widely across Parliament, to advance our key priorities, which include: 

• Prioritising the integrated digital patient care record and ensuring this is available to pharmacists in all care settings, with read-and-write access;

• Undertaking comprehensive workforce planning for pharmacy, so we can ensure that Scotland has the right numbers of pharmacists working at any one time, across all sectors and the right skill mix to support services;

• Prioritising the introduction of electronic prescribing across the NHS and improving the availability of data about the environmental impact of medicines;

• Ensuring that protected and funded development time within the working day for pharmacists is embedded in workforce planning. 

The Royal College of Pharmacy will be seeking an introductory meeting with the cabinet secretary to discuss these policy priorities. 

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