A GP pressured two mothers into having their baby sons circumcised by an insufficiently experienced surgeon friend who botched the operations, a disciplinary hearing heard yesterday.

Dr Michael Harbinson, of Rowlands Gill, Tyne and Wear, gave the children's North Durham mothers no choice about who would perform the operation when he referred them to Newcastle surgeon Peter Silverstone.

But Mr Silverstone failed to anaesthetise either boy properly, causing them both to scream uncontrollably, the General Medical Council's (GMC) professional conduct committee was told.

One of them also suffered bleeding after he was sent home, the hearing was told.

Dr Harbinson, a GP, and Mr Silverstone, a retired obstetrician and gynaecologist who worked at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead for many years, both deny serious professional misconduct by providing substandard treatment to patients before, during and after operations.

Zoe Johnson, GMC counsel, told the hearing: "Dr Harbinson, as GP to both boys, was responsible for encouraging the parents to have their boys circumcised.

''He presented the case as a fait accompli. He did not explain the alternative to circumcision. He did not give the parents choices in procedure and choices in the type of surgeon.

''Mr Silverstone was insufficiently experienced in circumcision for medical purposes."

Mr Silverstone operated on the first boy, referred to as A, who was six and a half months old, on April 26, 1998.

But he "failed to ensure the boy had appropriate analgesia," Miss Johnson said.

The second boy, called B, was six months old when Mr Silverstone carried out the procedure on September 22, 1998. The surgeon "failed to provide adequate analgesia and allowed the boy to go home without stopping the bleeding", Miss Johnson said.

She said: "As she (Mrs A) waited she heard her son screaming as if in agony."

The operations were at Dryburn Hospital, Durham.

Mr Silverstone also denies allegations that he failed in his treatment of two women hysterectomy patients, the details of which will be heard at a later date.

The hearing was adjourned until tomorrow.