I was in the queue at my local pharmacists earlier today, waiting to be told that my latest prescription wasn’t ready (“Try again on Thursday.” “What, tomorrow?” “No, Thursday week.”) and chatted amiably with fellow patients also waiting to be told their medication wasn’t ready, either. We got into a discussion about prescription charges which were increased to £9.65 an item last April. We all agreed it was an outrageous amount to charge people, although admittedly most of us in the queue, though not all, were exempt from costs due to old age. Since last year, the pharmacy has displayed a sign to explain the new cost, but interestingly, perhaps uniquely, the sign displayed on the screen revealed some facts which clearly came as a surprise to some people. All prescriptions are free. None of the monies raised from prescriptions go directly to the NHS.
Now, I knew this, but my new friends didn’t. Each £9.65 is a tax on a prescription. It’s like duty on beer or fags. Everything collected goes to Jeremy Hunt and is then passed to very rich people who sell the government dodgy PPE, for example. When people hear the words, prescription charges – and the pharmacy literally calls them that before explaining in smaller writing that it’s actually tax.
Helpfully, they reminded us that the only people in the UK who play prescription taxes are those of us living in England. In the devolved states of Scotland, Wales and Norn Iron, no one pays prescription taxes. If the absence of prescription taxes is a devolution bonus, can we have it too, please?
The trouble with that argument is devolved England would permanently elect Tory governments and, as you should know by now, the Tory party, certainly in its current guise, doesn’t even agree with the existence of the NHS, never mind allowing people to get the drugs they need without a swingeing tax being placed on them. In other words, if we took control of certain areas, including health, we’d probably end up paying even more, not less.
When I was less comfortable financially than I am now, I had to think twice before having prescriptions from my GP (back in the days when you could actually see a GP). “Which one do I need most?” I’d ask and I’d tell her/him to forget the less important one and hope whatever else I had would magically go away on its own. GPs hate having to tell patients which drugs they need most and least because the simple fact is that everything they prescribe IS actually needed.
The government collects something like £600 million a year in prescription taxes, which is, in terms of government spending, small change found down the back of the sofa and I would like the next government to abolish the tax altogether.
It’s far more likely to stay the same if Labour wins because of the mess it will inherit from the Conservatives and more likely still that the prescription tax exemption will be raised from 60 to the official retirement age if the Tories win a fifth successive term of office. But at the very least it should be an aspiration, of not a policy.
I just think it is unfair to tax people for being sick. There’s enough to worry about when you’re unwell without having to fret about whether you can afford to pay prescription taxes.
Finally, it is worth pointing out that prescription taxes were introduced by the Conservative government in 1952, scrapped by Labour in 1965, but reintroduced by them three years later when the economy was going to ratshit. That was a big mistake by Labour and someday soon they need to right that wrong.
