According to Health Education England (HEE), the organisation will achieve its ‘worst case scenario’ for GP recruitment by 2020, which will exceed the Government’s target of 5,000 extra doctors by more than 300.

The figure of 5,381 it has cited is both the worst and most likely case for recruitment in general practice over the next four years the HEE said, which includes registrars. Its target for this year alone is 3,250, which will entail the body commissioning 134 additional training programmes underpinned by 51 additional posts.

However, GP leaders have said that recruiting an extra 5,000 GPs by 2020 is not possible and many critics have picked up on the fact that Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt’s plans include persuading existing staff not to leave and trying to tempt leavers back into the profession.

In the final round of recruitment last year 180 applicants were successfully attracted to posts but filling positions in some regions remains “worryingly low”, as 384 posts are still vacant. In addition, one in 10 GP trainee posts is not filled.

However, a spokesman for the HEE insists that the organisation is training significantly more people to work in every healthcare profession than those that are anticipated to be leaving or retiring between now and 2020.

He added that an additional 115,000 nursing and midwifery commissions will have been placed into universities between 2012 and the end of this year and said that the organisation is planning further, comprehensive national co-ordination of local planning for the major medical specialities and will have recommendations on these shortly for 2017.

Despite these assurances, GPs remain unconvinced, with some concerned that the Government might be intending to “re-classify the definition of GP to include medical associates not on the General Medical Council (GMC) register.”