General Pharmaceutical Council
The General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC) has failed to meet the Professional Standards Authority’s (PSA) standard on the timely resolution of fitness-to-practise (FtP) cases for the eighth consecutive year.
In its annual performance review, published on 30 September 2026, the PSA — which sets standards for all UK health regulators — noted that the GPhC met 17 of its 18 ‘Standards of good regulation’.
However, the annual performance review, which covered the time period from July 2025 to June 2026, also said that the GPhC failed to meet the standard on timeliness of its FtP process “because it continues to take too long to resolve FtP cases”.
In addition, the PSA highlighted that the average time to resolve a case has increased every year since 2018/2019. The figures for 2025/2026 show that the median time for progressing FtP referrals sits at 156 weeks, or three years.
In 2025/2026, there was also a rise in FtP cases open for more than a year, with 316 cases, which increased from 305 cases during the previous year. This figure is lower than the two years prior to 2024–2025.
“The GPhC has over 100 cases awaiting a final FTP hearing, of which over half have been open for more than three years,” the performance review said.
The PSA has sent a written update on the regulator’s performance to the secretary of state for health and social care and the chair of the House of Commons health and social care committee, as well as their counterparts in the devolved administrations.
In its letter to health secretary Yvette Cooper, sent on 23 September 2026, the PSA said: “Although this is one standard out of 18, it does represent a critical part of the work of the GPhC in protecting the public. Delays to FTP cases also have negative impacts on registrants, complainants and witnesses and present a risk to public confidence.”
In 2023, the PSA first wrote to the then health secretary Steve Barclay, expressing concern over the GPhC’s performance on timeliness of its FtP process. At the time, Duncan Rudkin, the then chief executive of the GPhC, said it was “an absolute priority” of the regulator to process FtP cases “in a timely way”.
Responding to the most recent performance review, Dionne Spence, chief enforcement officer at the GPhC, said that the regulator had increased resources in its FtP teams, strengthened its triage function, introduced clearer acceptance criteria, increased decision-making capacity and improved its hearings function.
Spence added: “We will shortly be testing the feasibility of an independent pharmacy concerns resolution service. Unlike many other health and care sectors, pharmacy currently has no independent route for consumer concerns that do not require regulatory action.
“We believe addressing that gap could improve the experience of patients and members of the public, while allowing us to focus more effectively on concerns that raise significant public protection issues.”
The regulator had set “ambitious” targets for the coming year, including increasing hearings capacity by 50% and “resolving the majority of our very aged investigations”, Spence continued.
Kathie Cashell, chief executive of the GPhC, commented: “In spite of this sustained increase in concerns received, we have continued to make sustained progress in improving the timeliness of our FtP function, with cases now being assessed within five weeks and most investigations being completed within 40 weeks.
“We are realistic about the scale of the remaining challenge and will continue to make the improvements needed to help us meet this standard on timeliness.”
In February 2026, the GPhC said it was introducing acceptance criteria for complaints to be treated as FtP concerns.
While, in September 2026, the regulator noted that it had seen an increase in FtP complaints of around one-third in 2025/2026, with a “sharp increase” in AI-generated complaints.
