Who was the only Tory MP to vote against the pharmacy cuts?

The majority of MPs who took part in a parliamentary debate voted in favour of the cuts to pharmacy funding in England.

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305 MPs voted in favour of the funding cuts

A total of 305 MPs voted for the cuts, including 299 Conservative MPs and six Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) MPs.

Two hundred and eleven MPs voted against the cuts, with a large proportion of Labour MPs joined by a handful of politicians from the Green Party, Liberal Democrats and others (see the graphs below for the vote split).

Jason McCartney, MP for Colne Valley in Huddersfield, was the only Conservative MP to vote against his party.

Before the vote, MPs took part in an opposition day debate, which was secured by Labour MPs.

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Debate highlights

Shadow health secretary and Labour MP Jonathon Ashworth led the debate and branded the cuts “arbitrary”. He reminded the House that the drop in funding will result in the closure of many pharmacies in some of the most deprived parts of the country.

MPs from across the parties took turns to respond. Former Labour chief whip Dame Rosie Winterton said pharmacists in her Doncaster constituency had called for the government to “sit down with pharmacists and engage in meaningful discussions”.

Pharmacy minister David Mowat responded, arguing that the government has to be “blind to the ownership of pharmacies”.

“The fact is that the average pharmacy sells for something like £750,000,” he said. "I do not accept that the proposals will cause closures in those segments.”

Sarah Wollaston, Conservative MP and chair of the Health Select Committee, was concerned that closures will come about in a “random way”, but Mr Mowat said the pharmacy access scheme is a “device” that will prevent this from happening.

Labour MP Luciana Berger asked Mr Mowat to clarify what he understood to be the difference between a community pharmacy and GP pharmacy. Mr Mowat responded that a community pharmacy is a “privately owned business” and “the [pharmacists] we are hiring into GP practices will leverage GP time and do medicine reviews”.

Julie Cooper, Labour MP for Burnley, tied up the debate by urging Mr Mowat to understand that "clusters" of pharmacies have grown “often in the most deprived areas in response to considerable demand”.

“I ask the minister to listen to his Conservative colleagues who spoke against these simplistic cuts, which have not been properly planned,” Ms Cooper added.

Read the full list of MPs who voted here

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