MORE than £7m would be needed by Swindon’s hospital trust to meet the Government’s priority of a seven-day health service.

In new figures released following a Freedom of Information (FOI) request, Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust calculated it would need at least £7.2m to extend its services.

NHS England set out a plan two years ago to drive seven-day services across the NHS and the Prime Minister said last May it was a key priority for the Government.

Although key services, such as accident and emergency at Great Western Hospital, already operate 24 hours a day, the extension is thought to open up weekends for planned operations and low-risk surgeries.

A spokeswoman for the trust said: "We fully support the move towards providing more healthcare services across seven days. The majority of our services are already available on a seven-day basis to patients requiring urgent and emergency care.

"However we are not currently in a position to extend our routine and pre-planned services to seven days a week. We continue to work with our commissioners to ensure all of our urgent and emergency services are accessible at the time of need.

"As a trust, our top priority is to ensure that the services we are already providing are of the safest and highest quality to all of our patients and we would like to reassure local people that our mortality rates are consistently strong at weekends, as well as throughout the working week.”

The Swindon trust is responsible for Great Western Hospital, community hospitals in Chippenham, Devizes, Melksham, Trowbridge and Warminster, plus Savernake Hospital.

It estimates it would require an additional 14 consultants to meet the Government’s demands for a wider-reaching service.

Just last month it emerged bosses at the trust had introduced a programme of savings to combat a £18.6m deficit, which is forecasted for the end of the current financial year.

In March, at the end of the last financial year, the trust had a deficit of £8.6m.

In a typical month 1,000 more patients are being seen than four years ago.

The majority of NHS hospitals have not planned or budgeted for a move to a seven-day health service, according to the figures released.

Four out of five NHS trusts have not calculated staffing levels or costs associated with weekend working.

The Government has made extending more hospital services across seven days a priority but the doctors' union and health leaders have criticised the plans.

Dr Paul Flynn, chairman of the British Medical Association's consultants' committee, said hospitals were unsure which services they would have to provide and would need more funding.

“You can't take the work we are doing over five days and spread it over seven. That's simply not going to work,” he said.

“Hospitals are under considerable pressure at the moment just to provide current services.

“It was never credible to think that we could have a step-change in the quality of what they were doing and also stay still in terms of finances."

A total of 119 of the 155 NHS hospital trusts in England responded to the broadcaster, Sky News with 62 saying they had made no preparations for increasing weekend services.

Some 35 said they were beginning to calculate costs and staffing needs, while 22 said they already provided a full service at weekends or had worked out how to do so.

Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals said its total bill would be £8.5m, with 34 more consultants required.