GP SURGERIES in South Yorkshire are failing to meet NHS targets for offering out-of-hours services, it was revealed today.
New figures show only a handful of practices in Sheffield, Rotherham and Doncaster have so far started seeing patients outside traditional opening hours.
The Government persuaded GPs to agree to new opening hours following a prolonged row earlier
this year with the British Medical Association.
Ministers have set a target that, by December, at least half of all surgeries should see patients for at least three hours a week outside of the usual 9am to 5pm opening times.
However, the Department of Health has revealed only two out of the 93 surgeries in the Sheffield Primary Care Trust area are so far offering the extended opening hours.
Similarly, only three of the 39 practices in Rotherham PCT are offering longer opening times. Seven out of 46 practices in Doncaster have extended their hours.
In contrast, Barnsley PCT hit the target five months early - 24 out of 43 surgeries now stay open later.
Sheffield PCT said it was confident it would reach, if not exceed, the Government target.
Director of standards and engagement at NHS Sheffield, Penny Brooks-Cordon, said more than 20 practices have signed up to a national framework on extended hours.
She said: "The Department of Health figure reflects the July position, from which we have already made significant strides and are on course to reach, if not exceed, the December target of 50 per cent of practices offering extended opening.
"The delay to the take-up is down to our wait for the national framework to be in place and, now it is, we've already seen 22 more practices sign up with plans from a further 17 currently being considered.
"We've asked each practice to show how they plan to put the extra hours in place to match what their patients want."
A spokesman for Doncaster PCT said: "We have received significant interest from local GP practices and are currently working through applications received from them.
"We are confident the Government's end of year target will be met."
Under contracts introduced four years ago, GPs received a 22 per cent pay rise but were able to opt out of delivering out-of-hours care.
The Government says GPs' failure to open outside of the normal working week is the public's biggest single gripe with the NHS.
In February, Health Secretary Alan Johnson wrote to every surgery in England to urge longer opening hours.
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