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RPS Board Elections: statement from English, Scottish and Welsh Pharmacy Boards

We believe the 2021 elections for the RPS national boards in England, Scotland and Wales will be among the most important and influential in recent years.

It’s a time of change and pressure across the health services as we try to navigate out of the Covid-19 pandemic, and it’s also a time of great change and potential for the RPS, there’s so much going on within the organisation.

Add to this the fact that far more places than usual will be available on the boards, due to an elections hiatus in 2020 caused by the Covid-19 pandemic situation, and it becomes clear why the 2021 elections process matters so much.

You can make a difference to the outcomes here. Our first plea is about standing for the board elections. Whatever setting(s) you work in, your level of experience, age, background etc, you are a member of the RPS and your views and abilities are valued.

There is no particular ‘type’ of pharmacist who can or can’t be a board member, or will or won’t make a good board member. Boards can only represent the full diversity of our profession if they are diverse themselves: that’s why we need members at different stages of their careers and from all sectors.  It’s not a full time job, you’re part of a team and the duties are designed to fit alongside day job commitments. Please consider standing.

Being an RPS national board member is about more than turning up to meetings. It’s about sharing your knowledge, views and experience with colleagues and the organisation to make sure what RPS is doing and saying are the right things, things that matter to our members and the wider profession. It’s also about taking a forward view of what’s best for the profession and patients in the future. It gives you the chance to express yourself professionally that is sometimes more difficult within the constraints of our day job roles.

If you’d like to have more of a chat about what it’s like to be a board member please feel free to drop an e-mail to [email protected] Serving as an RPS Board member can be very professionally rewarding, you get to meet and work with some fantastic people both within RPS and from other patient and professional organisations.

We know there are countless pharmacists out there who can make an amazing contribution to the work of the RPS and deserve to benefit professionally and personally too.

Our second & final plea to all RPS members: when the time comes, please vote. It doesn’t take long, a quick read of what candidates have to say and a few clicks on the screen. If you’ve voted in previous elections, thank you & please do so again this year. If you’ve never voted before, or only do so occasionally, please vote this year.

Members of the National Pharmacy Boards, March 2021

Nominations for the 2021 Board Elections are now open. To find out more about standing in the upcoming elections, click here.

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