THANK you for publishing MP Peter Luff''s view on the Worcestershire Health Service (Worcester News, Thursday, June 16). It demonstrates exactly why politicians are not respected by many people who are now not bothering to vote.

Most people would agree with his anger at closing wards in our local hospitals but I would look back further than him to the root cause of these problems.

It was with his support that the creeping privatisation of our NHS started. It is to this government's discredit that they failed to halt this trend that has led to constant funding crisis, lack of bed space and people travelling many miles to receive hospital attention.

You will notice that Peter Luff MP makes many criticisms but offers no solutions. He mentions the opposition of Dr Richard Taylor MP who was elected as an independent MP purely on the issue of the partial closing of Kidderminster Hospital.

If Peter Luff's party had such good policies for the NHS why didn't the voters of Kidderminster elect a Tory MP? He also criticises the Government for the cost of the new GP contracts. He omits to say that these contracts, with shorter hours, more money and no compulsory out-of-hours cover by GPs, were forced upon the Government by the GPs threatening to withdraw their services.Peter Luff MP complains that the Government has built a new hospital in Worcester that is too small. The fact that most of the planning was done during the tenure of his party goes is not mentioned. Criticism is a factor that must always be present but it must be constructive criticism.

Peter Luff's article gives me the impression that he has no solution to the problem other than to criticise others for failings he has had a hand in.

In plain man's English it is "the pot calling the kettle black".

T A JAMES,

Drakes Broughton,

Worcestershire.