John D’Arcy, Managing Director of Numark, commented on the EU Referendum, saying, ‘It is good to see that the marathon like discussions have led to an agreement on UK’s continued membership of the EU. According to David Cameron the deal will give Britain greater sovereignty and political autonomy while remaining at the heart of a reformed Europe.
‘Whether or not this agreement is sufficient to assuage the growing numbers of ‘out’ campaigners remains to be seen and the coming weeks prior to the vote on 23rd June will clarify much of the detail and will influence the final decision.
‘On the face of it, one might take a view that UK is better in Europe in terms of the synergy inherent in a larger trading mass given the increasing dominance of economies such as China, USA and Russia. This is presumably the view of the 100 biggest companies operating in the UK who are backing the campaign to stay in Europe.
‘That said, UK is the fifth largest trading nation in the world and an alternative view, that does seem to be gathering momentum, is that we will be able to ‘go it alone.’ More importantly the ‘out’ campaign has its support from a belief that the UK suffers from an inability of elected politicians to have any autonomy in the wake of the Brussels Agenda. Top of the list of exemplars is immigration.
‘From a pharmacy perspective, there will probably be little change. Health is already devolved with each European country doing its own thing depending upon the individual systems and incentives for driving and paying for professional practice. However, virtually all pharmacy legislation is derived from Europe. And even if we leave Europe, most of the legislation will still apply because it will become part of the conditions of entering into a free trade agreement if we get that far. Accordingly, things like the Falsified Medicines Directive will not go away and leave us with the implementation nightmare we already face. There might also be problems associated with getting hold of parallel imports or European employees should we leave.
‘The coming weeks will provide clarity on what the deal struck with Europe means in reality and an improved understanding of the respective cases for the ‘in’ or ‘out’ options. Numark will be studying the emerging detail with a view to giving the most appropriate advice to members.’
