Since the last annual report, there have been eight group meetings; three professional meetings, three business meetings and two social meetings. Average attendance at the meetings was around 20, with the social events being the best attended as usual. The District Member was in attendance at most of the meetings.

The Group Committee met once to determine the syllabus for the 1999/2000 session.

Membership at March 2000 is around 270.

The Group was represented at the Group Secretaries Day.

The Group was represented at the Group Delegates Meeting by three members.

The Group was represented at the Weekend School by the District Member.

This was the AGM and last meeting in the 1998/99 session. The Group Committee was elected at the meeting, and the office bearers appointed were -

This was the annual ten-pin bowling competition. The winners this year were the team from the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley once again.

"New Roles for Pharmacy Technicians" was the title of the debate and a very successful meeting attended by both pharmacists and technicians.

The Business Meeting had its usual low attendance. However, there was some useful discussion on the G.D.M. motions, and the selection of delegates.

This was a joint meeting with the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain entitled "Medication Errors"

This was the annual quiz night, and won by a team from the Western Infirmary - the Witches of Westwick.

Methadone prescribing as it affects the hospital pharmacist, and an update on hepatitis C were the subjects of a joint presentation by Kay Roberts and Ysobel Gourlay.

The one meeting of the session remaining is the A.G.M. which takes place on Thursday 30th March 2000.

The unavailability of pharmacists willing to act as accredited representatives is still worrying. So is the lack of involvement of the younger pharmacists in any of the Guild activities, locally or nationally. There is still considerable uncertainty about the effects of Trust mergers.

The changes in the NHSiS proposed by the White Paper "Designed to Care" and the Human Resources Strategy are significant, and I find it useful that in my role as Chair of the Staffside of the sector Trust Joint Consultative Committee I have been able to attend various meetings on partnership, and the way forward. The ramifications of "learning together" and the Modernisation Project will no doubt become clearer over the next year.

COLIN RODDEN
18 March 2000