A new pharmacy will be built at the site of a new health hub in Crediton, Devon, after the local council approved a £240,000 loan for its construction, it said.
On June 6, the Mid Devon district council signed off a loan to construct a new pharmacy at the Redlands primary care building, according to a council meeting report.
The loan will be paid off at a “commercial rate” over 13 years, the council told C+D last week (June 8).
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The new “integrated health hub” was recently built at the site in Crediton to replace the old Chiddenbrook Surgery in the town.
The health hub, which opened in 2021, is “mostly funded” by the NHS, but the council had already provided the GP surgery with an additional £2.175 million loan on a commercial basis, according to the report.
The additional £240,000 “long-term” loan will allow a pharmacy to be built at the health hub, after the practice “approached the council for an additional loan to build a new pharmacy building attached to the practice”, the report said.
The new site will be run by an existing pharmacy that occupied the old Chiddenbrook site in Crediton, according to a council spokesperson.
“Local pharmacy solution”
The council report noted that local residents with protected characteristics would “benefit from a more localised pharmacy solution”.
And it added that “providing a local pharmacy solution will reduce the need for residents to travel to get their medical supplies”.
A council spokesperson told C+D that the Mid Devon district council is “keen to further support the wellbeing of Crediton residents through this loan to build a new pharmacy on a site at the new Redlands GP Hub”.
The loan for the pharmacy will be lent “on the same commercial basis as the existing loan”, avoiding “any State Aid issues”, the council report said.
Read more: Pharmacy buyer registrations ‘rocketed by colossal 202%’ in 2023, broker reveals
It added that the council “may decide to fund the advance” on the £240,000 loan by borrowing internally.
This, it said, “increases the surplus made” on the loan as it would bypass any payments to external lenders.
Further details of the loan were not revealed by the council as they were “commercially sensitive”, the report said.
According to the report, the loan would earn the council “a higher return than if this sum was lent on the market”.
And it said that “all costs incurred…will be met by the surgery”, although it predicted that these would be “minimal due to the existing relationship”.
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The council considered the loan to have “a low risk of default” since it would be given to an “NHS body”, it added.
It comes after the broker Christie & Co revealed earlier this week (June 12) that a “very well-located” pharmacy in Wales had hit the market with a £1.5m asking price.
And a “beautifully refitted” North London pharmacy was sold by the specialist broker Hutchings for an undisclosed price after just four weeks on the market, C+D reported on Tuesday (June 13).
Last month, Hutchings’ annual report revealed that the number of pharmacy buyer registrations “rocketed by a colossal 202%” in the first quarter of 2023.
