A chemist was fighting for his livelihood yesterday after being accused of dispensing controlled drugs without a prescription.

Ian Bell, of Dunottar Avenue, Eaglescliffe, near Stockton, repeatedly asked a GP to backdate prescriptions for drugs he had already dispensed, it is alleged.

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society's statutory committee, sitting in south-east London, heard that Mr Bell was a majority shareholder and superintendent pharmacist at Bellpharm Ltd, in Lealholm Crescent, Ormesby, Middlesbrough.

Geoffrey Hudson, for the society, said the pharmacy supplied medicines to the Levick House residential home, in Middlesbrough.

Since 1999, one resident had been prescribed tablets of MST, a controlled drug (CD), he said.

However, on October 1, 2001, the company supplied 60 tablets before receiving a GP's prescription and no entry was made in the controlled drugs register that day or the next. The alleged offence was said to have been repeated on October 29 that year.

Mr Bell is also said to have failed to endorse prescriptions written by the GP on two occasions, and failed to make current entries in the controlled drugs register for another resident.

Mr Hudson said Mr Bell wrote to the GP saying: "If we don't get the required prescription, we still deliver the medication or the patients does not get the right drugs.

"The staff did not alert me to the CD prescription and we just asked for double next month. I know this is not the best method for CDs, but I don't see why I should not have these prescriptions written, as they were requested in advance in each case."

Despite requests, the GP said it would be illegal for her to backdate the prescriptions.

Mr Hudson said: "He clearly has professional responsibilities to ensure all legal requirements are met. The society says the facts show he failed to discharge these responsibilities."

Mr Hudson also asked that the premises be removed from the register.

The hearing continues.