A YORK doctor has charged into the political battlefield once again by claiming some surgery bosses alert doctors about when their targets are to be checked.

Surgeries are under pressure to ensure patients are seen within 48 hours - a target which has become an election issue for both Labour and Conservatives.

Dr David Fair, who ambushed Health minister Rosie Winterton about the NHS "target-driven culture" during her visit to York, has now revealed that some doctors are tipped off about when those targets are going to be checked.

"It distorts the figures. It means the statistics are virtually meaningless," said the Jorvik Medical Practice GP.

Jeremy Clough, of the Selby and York Primary Care Trust, confirmed: "Once a month we carry out a primary care access survey. That means that we phone all the practices in our patch and ask them when they have available appointments. They answer those questions. It is on a fixed day of each month, and we do that once a month."

Opposition leader Michael Howard has pledged to scrap centrally imposed targets which he said "get in the way of the ability of doctors and nurses to exercise clinical judgement".

Updated: 10:18 Monday, May 02, 2005