Joint Statement – Boots UK and PDA Union Joint Consultative Committee
On Thursday 1 July 2021, Boots UK and the Pharmacists’ Defence Association Union (PDA Union) held their Joint Consultative Committee (JCC) virtually.
This marks the seventh of our regular consultation meetings relating to the agreed items as defined within the recognition agreement, a copy of which can be found here. The JCC meets once a quarter.
The JCC focuses on matters for consultation on a collective basis and will not discuss matters relating to individuals. The JCC is not a negotiating forum, anything for negotiation (matters relating to pay, hours or holidays) are discussed at the Joint Negotiating Body (JNB) which meets annually.
The meeting was chaired by Anne Higgins, Director of Stores Pharmacy and was attended by all Regional and Divisional PDA Union representatives along with Mark Pitt, Director of Defence Services and Paul Day, Director, PDA in attendance.
There was a positive, two-way conversation with feedback provided through Divisional and Regional Trade Union Representatives. The agenda included two standard items for discussion; health and safety and company-based training. The presenters attended:
- Richard Dunne, Senior Manager, Pharmacy Learning and Development, provided an update on Clinical training for Flu and hosted a clinical progression Q&A session.
- James Sutcliffe, Senior Commercial Manager Vaccines and Jyoti Bakshi, Head of Pharmacy for London and Travel highlighted store and appointment booking improvements, mass vaccination customer journey and support available to Pharmacists.
- Ray Humprey, Senior Safety Manager and Leeann Morgan, Safety Partner for Stores and optics, provided insights into the monthly H&S meetings between Boots & the PDA Union, Pharmacy accident performance, incidents of note, needlestick injuries, Pharmacy shelving inspections, MyHub – safety inspection insights and inspections of the workplace by local authorities.
- Iona Blake, Security & Incident Manager gave an overview of incidents against people, an update on burglary data, Safer City and Body Worn Video trials. A short video was shown regarding the expansion of the CCTV monitoring centre.
All the PDA Union representatives had chance to contribute and feedback throughout the meeting through the raising of questions with the presenters. Mark Pitt shared that the PDA Union are keen to help with engagement of the flu programme along with any communication. Topics were raised and solutions have been captured and highlighted to the company so that both parties can continue to work in partnership.
An overview of the minutes and key actions are available here. The next JCC meeting is scheduled to take place on 20 October 2021. We will provide regular updates on the progress of actions. For previous meeting minutes click here or for updates on actions to date click here.
Kind regards,
Anne Higgins, Director of Stores Pharmacy– Boots UK
Paul Day, Director, PDA
NB: The links within the statement above are deliberately inactive. Boots pharmacists can access the links and documents referred to above, via the internal Boots live platform where this statement is also published.
Download the statement here:
Related links
- Joint statement – Boots & the PDA Union (18 January 2021)
- Joint statement – Boots & the PDA Union (30 December 2020)
- Joint statement – Boots & the PDA Union (20 October 2020)
- Joint statement – Boots & the PDA Union (24 September 2020)
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