The Government’s decision to give NHS workers the biggest pay rise in 20 years will come as a “slap in the face” to underfunded community pharmacies, the PSNC has said.

PSNC chief Janet Morrison made her comments yesterday after the Government announced it had accepted in full the recommendations of an independent NHS pay review body, with doctors and dentists to receive a 4.5 per cent pay rise and some of the lowest earners in the health service to get increases of up to 9.3 per cent.

Ms Morrison said: “The Government’s agreement to award public sector workers a pay rise this year will feel like yet another slap in the face for community pharmacy teams.

“While we recognise that many of our NHS colleagues will desperately need an uplift in the face of uncontrolled inflationary rises, we are clear that contractors and their teams need and deserve the same help.

“This is particularly the case as satisfaction with other healthcare services falls off a cliff and pharmacies are being left, as always, to pick up the pieces for their local communities.

“Contractors will know that we are currently negotiating CPCF arrangements and as you would expect, we are pushing very hard on this.

“Government and the NHS have all the evidence they need of both the value of pharmacies and of the very precarious economic situation that businesses are in, and they must now back up their praise for pharmacies with much-needed financial support.”

The Department of Health and Social Care has been approached for comment.