A day after chancellor Rachel Reeves announced the Autumn Budget, National Pharmacy Association (NPA) chair Olivier Picard remarked that the budget would widen the community pharmacy funding gap.
In a LinkedIn post, he said the budget has made his life harder.
"From April 2026, the National Living Wage rises by 4.1 percent, with an 8.5 percent jump for 18–20-year-olds.
"That’s great news for my team, who deserve it for the work they do every day on the NHS frontline, but brutal for my pharmacy’s payroll."
He pointed out that for those running independent pharmacies with a 10-person team, it would mean £20,000–£30,000 extra a year.
"This is on top of all inflationary pressures, IT costs, utility bills and the ever increasing drug bill!
The OBR forecasts wages growing 3.7 percent next year, comfortably above the 2.5 percent CPI inflation rate. My wage bill is outpacing prices. Yet my NHS income remains stuck in negative."
He said, "Despite a near 20 percent funding uplift to £3.07bn agreed for the Community Pharmacy last year, the NHS own independent economic analysis still shows a £2.6bn annual gap remains between funding and actual costs for community pharmacies to deliver pharmaceutical services and dispensing in England.
"In a normal business, I’d raise prices to cover rising costs. In an NHS community pharmacy, core fees are fixed nationally. My costs keep rising on schedule, but funding doesn’t.
"I’m fighting hard for a fair, sustainable funding deal on behalf of all contractors, but this Autumn Budget has made the funding black hole even bigger!"
Layoff, closure fears
The NPA had earlier urged the Government to address years of underfunding so that community pharmacies can avoid staff lay-offs to cover the increasing costs of the national living wage and the minimum wage.
NPA chief executive Henry Gregg said, “Pharmacy staff across the country are absolutely deserving of a pay rise, but the increases announced today will add significantly to the financial pressures pharmacies are under as businesses and as a core component of the health service across the UK."
Community Pharmacy England chief executive Janet Morrison had also expressed concern over the wage hike announcement and said it would impose higher staffing costs on community pharmacy businesses.
She said it may prove unmanageable for some pharmacy owners as they continue to grapple with extreme financial and operational pressures.
The Independent Pharmacies Association had said the increase in the minimum wage "without any support for already struggling businesses will push more branches towards closure."
Many parts of the country are already facing the consequences of the abrupt closure of Jhoots Pharmacy branches, making it harder for patients to procure their essential medicines.
Pharmacy outlet sales
A recent report by specialist pharmacy broker Hutchings Consultants has stated that this year, the corporate and multiple operators have divested their assets rather than expand.
It noted that seller instructions rose by 91 percent compared with the previous year, with corporate and multiple operators accounting for 71.3 percent of all sales instructions.
