IN a letter to The Guardian headed "The future of the NHS is at stake" (September 24) a group of eminent people including senior Labour politicians and academics drew attention to government reforms that create a market in acute health care "that welcomes profit-driven international corporations and will compel hospitals and health professionals to compete with each other".

This letter launched a campaign "to protect the NHS from further privatisation and fragmentation". I strongly support this campaign as clinical needs must always take priority over market forces.

Wyre Forest is widely respected for revolting in elections against government pressure and is quoted now as an example of effective use of the ballot box and a precedent to follow to make the government change its mind.

Because of these reforms hospitals throughout the country risk having to merge and lose services and this will propel people to the ballot box as it did here.

Campaigners from several areas are approaching me for advice on opposition to closures or changes at their acute and community hospitals.

It is going to be an extremely hard battle. The Health Secretary is reported to have said at the Labour Party conference that she could not understand why the Government's reforms are seen as marketisation.

The spin machine is already at work as "competition" is now called "contestability"

! It was Lewis Carroll's Humpty Dumpty who said so presciently: "When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean, - neither more nor less."

Last Friday was the annual Macmillan Cancer Relief World's Biggest Coffee Morning.

There were many local events but I only managed to get to four, accompanied by my wife Chris to three.

At St Anne's First School whole classes were allowed in for breaks throughout the morning. At Lickhill many parents came in early on the school run and at another event members of the organiser's family had been allowed a day off to assist.

Everywhere the coffee was good, the cakes excellent and the generosity superb. I hope we will learn soon the total raised this year for the vital work of Macmillan.

I officially opened the Capital Medical Training state-of-the-art premises for training medical engineers at Hartlebury and was pleased to learn that they are now training more NHS staff in addition to MoD personnel.

There is an opportunity for economy in the NHS if health trusts would employ their own fully qualified medical engineers instead of relying on expensive call-outs from equipment suppliers.

Capital Medical provides the first wide-ranging, accredited training in this specialty in the country.

I attended the opening of the new visually-friendly, timber-clad Horticultural Building at Camphill, Ashfield, Iverley, improving the opportunities for gardening work for people with learning difficulties.

It was good to see so many enjoying another event celebrating the excellent work of volunteers in our community.