Our work

PHARMAC
We are principal legal advisor to PHARMAC, the Government agency set up to manage expenditure on pharmaceuticals. We advise on many aspects of its work including its role in purchasing hospital pharmaceuticals on behalf of all district health boards, purchasing strategies, tender processes and contracting.

Judicial Review of PHARMAC's Herceptin decision
Bell Gully acted for PHARMAC on a judicial review by a group of breast cancer sufferers challenging PHARMAC's decisions around Herceptin, a pharmaceutical for the treatment of a particular kind of breast cancer (HER 2 positive breast cancer). A nine-week course of this pharmaceutical is publicly funded in New Zealand for HER 2 positive early breast cancer.

District Health Boards laboratory services procurement
Bell Gully has advised seven District Health Boards (DHBs) on their laboratory services procurement processes relating to the market for blood testing, which accounts for NZ$300 million in government spending annually. These have been among the highest profile government procurement processes in recent years, with a contract worth NZ$500 million over a period of years entered into by the three Auckland DHBs (for which Bell Gully did not act) being overturned on judicial review and subsequently reinstated by the Court of Appeal. This and the contracts on which Bell Gully advised have attracted significant media attention and Parliamentary debate.

District Health Boards of New Zealand (DHBNZ) collective decision-making and collective procurement
The overall purpose of DHBNZ is to assist the District Health Boards (DHBs) in meeting their objectives and accountabilities to the Crown. Bell Gully is advising DHBNZ, on behalf of the 21 district health boards that comprise DHBNZ, on collective decision-making on policy and procurement, as well as the collective procurement of a range of goods and services.