A new version of the contract for general practitioners enshrines a mandate for surgeries to provide during core hours a digital option for booking appointments, requesting medicines and other enquiries

The new GP contract will require surgeries to offer patients online services throughout essential operating hours.

A new condition set out in the 2025/26 version of the contract, which takes effect from the start of October, stipulates that practices must have “online consultation tools switched on for the duration of core hours” – a period which lasts from 8am to 6.30pm, the document states.

Services that must be provided during this window include “non-urgent appointment requests, medication queries and admin requests”.

The contract adds: “This will be subject to necessary safeguards in place to avoid urgent clinical requests erroneously submitted online. Guidance will be displayed on practice websites and reflected in the wording of the patient charter.”

This digital charter will provide patients with “clearer information about the care they can expect to receive… including the services available to them”, according to the Department of Health and Social Care.

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Elsewhere, the department claimed that “burdensome red tape on GPs will be reduced by scrapping unnecessary targets like those requiring practices to report on staff wellbeing meetings or to explain how they are reviewing staff access to IT systems”.

Out of 76 targets on which surgeries are currently required to regularly report their progress, 32 will be removed from the 2025/26 version of the contract.

Health and social care secretary Wes Streeting said: “Rebuilding the broken NHS starts with GPs. Patients need to be able to easily book an appointment, in the manner they want, with their regular doctor if they choose. Today, we have taken the first step to fixing the front door to the NHS, bringing back the family doctor, and ending the 8am scramble.”

He added: “Over the past decade, funding for GPs has been cut relative to the rest of the NHS, while the number of targets for GPs has soared. That’s why patients are struggling to get an appointment. This government is cutting the red tape that ties up GPs time and backing them with an extra £889 million next year. In return, more patients will be able to request appointments online and see their regular doctor for each appointment. Through the prime minister’s Plan for Change, we will work with GPs to rebuild the NHS and make it fit for the future.”