Last week, the PDA announced that it had “agreed terms under which BPA [could] transfer into the PDA Union” pending the results of a ballot, after Boots' own union recognised “that there is now no sustainable future for the BPA as a separate body”.
Now, a PDA spokesperson confirmed to C+D that “voting in the ballot starts on Friday October 18 and will close on Friday November 8”.
The PDA yesterday (October 17) told C+D that the voting period gives “individuals a three-week period within which votes can be cast and received by the returning officer”.
Read more: ‘No sustainable future’: Boots union members to vote on merging with PDA
“BPA members will be asked in the postal ballot if they endorse the proposed merger which has already been agreed by the two unions’ executive committees and is already approved by the trade union regulator,” it said.
“If the proposal is agreed by a majority of those who vote, the BPA will cease to be a separate entity on January 1 2025 and it will be absorbed into the PDA,” it added.
It stressed that “PDA members will not be balloted as the much larger organisation will continue to exist whatever the ballot outcome”.
“A new chapter”
“The BPA has stated that the merger is a way for their ‘story to continue in a new chapter as part of the PDA’ rather than it ending this year,” the PDA said.
It added that the “PDA has previous success of reinvigorating long-standing pharmacy organisations”, having absorbed the National Association of Women Pharmacists (NAWP) – “which was founded in 1905” – in 2020.
Read more: National Association of Women Pharmacists to continue under the PDA
“NAWP was then in a similar situation to the BPA now, having considered closing down in 2019,” it said.
“But it has prospered as part of the PDA and will celebrate its 120th anniversary next year,“ it added.
UK first
In 2018, Boots pharmacists voted to “derecognise” Boots’ own union – the BPA – “enabling a second ballot in 2019 to recognise the PDA Union”.
The 2018 vote to derecognise the BPA was the “first time [the] process has ever been undertaken in the UK”, the PDA Union claimed at the time.
“No group of employees has ever taken a campaign to end recognition of a non-independent trade union this far down the legal process,” it said.
Read more: Boots and the PDA: The never-ending story
It came after six Boots pharmacists lodged a legal challenge to formally “derecognise” the BPA with the Central Arbitration Committee (CAC) – the independent body responsible for resolving workplace disputes – in July 2017.
The dispute dates back to January 2012, when the PDA Union called for official recognition from Boots, after alleging that the multiple’s staff employment terms were being “gradually eroded”.
