Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

I am a strong fan of competition. I am old enough to remember when there was no competition in certain markets. Protectionism protects nobody and certainly not consumers. Society does better when there is fair competition. Furthermore, these markets are regulated. There are regulatory bodies and the recent legislation provides, for the first time, for the regulation of the corporate entities in addition to the pharmacists. That has been broadly welcomed by pharmacists. We have legislated to tackle the conflict of interest between prescribing and dispensing which was, again, an issue of huge concern to pharmacists. To be fair, the Government has done a great deal to develop the pharmacy profession, in particular to allow our pharmacists to open pharmacies in this country, which previously they could not do if they had not graduated here.

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