Since winning a vote to officially represent Boots pharmacists in March, the PDA Union has seen “increasing membership” from pharmacists at the multiple, national officer Paul Day told C+D yesterday (August 29).

At the time of the ballot, 2,500 of Boots’ roughly 7,000 pharmacists were signed up as members. But this number is “increasing all the time”, said Mr Day, although he declined to disclose the exact figure.

The vote resulted in Boots and the PDA Union signing a joint agreement in July allowing the trade body to negotiate pay, hours and holiday for the multiple's pharmacists.

Mr Day said the “big topic” currently underway is the pay claim submitted by the PDA Union to Boots on behalf of its pharmacists, calling for an increase in pay of up to 3%.

Training representatives

As part of the agreement, a network of PDA Union representatives for the multiple has been established, consisting of 17 pharmacists who will work as trade union officials in different areas of the country.

They are going through a “structured training process”, which will cover issues such as employment law and representing colleagues in grievance and disciplinary meetings, Mr Day said.

“They’re all intelligent qualified people who know what they’re doing as pharmacists, but this is a different aspect to their work”, he added.