PHARMACEUTICAL PRICING REGULATION SCHEME

That this House notes the Pharmaceutical Pricing Regulation Scheme (PPRS), a voluntary scheme where drugs companies pay a rebate to the Department of Health when NHS spending on branded medicines goes above agreed growth rates; further notes that the PPRS payment estimate for the UK in 2014-15 is £443 million and in 2015-16 is £995 million, of which the revised estimates of PPRS payments subsequently allocated to NHS England are £363 million and £796 million for those years respectively; shares industry concern that it is not clear where exactly these funds go once they have been allocated to the devolved health administrations; believes rebates from drugs companies should be properly accounted for and be used for spending on drugs; and therefore calls on the Department of Health to ringfence PPRS payments specifically to pay for drugs, in order to ensure patients elsewhere in the UK can also get access to much-needed treatments as soon as possible.