SIR - Earlier this month it was reported that the Government predicted an NHS deficit of £620m.

Perhaps the people on those long hospital waiting lists who have been told that their operations are so 'minor' will be comforted by the knowledge that Mr Blair has given away more than £64bn of their taxes to the EU for new sewers for Budapest, a ring road around Warsaw, and to pay for the Paris riots.

British taxpayers' money should be spent in improving living standards in Britain. One worthy project would be a national water grid to bring surplus rain water from Scotland and the north of England to the South East where the reservoirs are still only half full and the taxpayers face having their water cut off in the summer.

C N BURKETT,

Hereford.