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Medicines Act 1981

Provisions relating to licences - Restrictions on persons allowed to operate pharmacies

55E: Restriction on individuals operating or holding majority interest in pharmacies

You could also call this:

"Only pharmacists can own or run most pharmacies"

Illustration for Medicines Act 1981

You can't run a pharmacy or own most of it unless you are a pharmacist. You might be exempt under an Order in Council made under section 105C. You could also be allowed if you are deemed to have a licence under section 114A(2). You are allowed to run a pharmacy if it is in a hospital you own. You can also run a pharmacy if you were already doing so when this law started. For this law, a person does not include a company. A pharmacist includes someone looking after a dead pharmacist's estate. It also includes someone taking care of a pharmacist's estate because they went bankrupt. A pharmacist can be a liquidator or someone managing a company's property. There is a time limit for some people to carry on a pharmacy. This time limit is one year after the pharmacist died or went bankrupt. The licensing authority can extend this time limit. In this law, having a majority interest in a pharmacy means owning more than 50% of the business. This is important for understanding who can run a pharmacy and who can own one.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM56022.

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55D: Restriction on companies operating pharmacies, or

"Rules for companies that want to own a pharmacy in New Zealand"

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55F: Prohibition on operating or holding of majority interest in more than 5 pharmacies, or

"You can't own or control more than 5 pharmacies."

Part 3Provisions relating to licences
Restrictions on persons allowed to operate pharmacies

55ERestriction on individuals operating or holding majority interest in pharmacies

  1. No person, either alone or in partnership, may be granted a licence to operate a pharmacy, or hold a majority interest, in a pharmacy unless—

  2. the person is a pharmacist; or
    1. the person is exempt from the requirements set out in paragraph (a) under an Order in Council made under section 105C or complies with any modification of those requirements authorised by that Order in Council; or
      1. the person is deemed to have been issued with a licence under section 114A(2); or
        1. the pharmacy is in a hospital owned or operated by the person; or
          1. the person, at the commencement of this section, was lawfully operating a pharmacy.

            1. For the purposes of subsection (1), a person does not hold an interest in a pharmacy merely by reason of the person's membership of a company, or of any other body of persons (whether corporate or unincorporate) other than a partnership, that is lawfully carrying on business in a pharmacy.

            2. For the purposes of subsection (1),—

              person does not include a company

                pharmacist includes the following persons:

                1. an administrator of the estate of a deceased pharmacist:
                  1. an assignee, within the meaning of the Insolvency Act 2006, carrying on a pharmacy in his or her capacity as assignee of the estate of a pharmacist:
                    1. a liquidator carrying on a pharmacy under the authority of section 260 and Schedule 6 of the Companies Act 1993:
                      1. a receiver or manager of the property of a company carrying on, subject to the Receiverships Act 1993, a pharmacy comprised in that property.

                      2. Subsection (3) does not entitle any person to carry on business in a pharmacy after—

                      3. the expiry of 1 year after the date of the death of the deceased pharmacist, or the date on which the pharmacist was adjudicated bankrupt, or the date of the first appointment of a liquidator, receiver, or manager, in respect of a company that has carried on a pharmacy; or
                        1. subject to any conditions that the licensing authority imposes, the expiry of any extended period or periods permitted by the licensing authority.

                          1. In this section and in section 55F, majority interest, in relation to a pharmacy, means an interest in the pharmacy of more than 50% of the value of the business or businesses undertaken in the pharmacy.

                          Compare
                          • 1970 No 143 s 43
                          Notes
                          • Section 55E: inserted, on , by section 17 of the Medicines Amendment Act 2003 (2003 No 50).
                          • Section 55E(3) pharmacist paragraph (b): amended, on , by section 445 of the Insolvency Act 2006 (2006 No 55).