I AM baffled by the silence on the crucial issues facing our local health provision. We were told that the Primary Care Trust currently delivering our health care would be transferred to a Social Enterprise (Gloucestershire Care Services) on October 1. This rang alarm bells for many and groups were set up in the Forest, Gloucester, Cheltenham, Stroud and now Tewksbury to campaign against this. We were all afraid that the forming of a new company, although funded by the NHS, would open the door to full scale privatisation and have disastrous and far reaching effects.

In the Forest we have campaigned vigorously, petitioned on the streets, expressed our concerns to Mark Harper and the council cabinet, presented letters of protest to Parliament and urged the local Labour Party to, at least, debate the issue.

We lobbied the executives of the new SET at their 'consultation exercise' at the Main Place. We have been listened to by the public who were generally in a state of disbelief that such radical changes to the NHS were being planned with hardly a whisper. Mark Harper and the councillors listened to us with completely closed minds.

As we know, October 1 came and went and the legal challenge to the handing over of services to the social enterprise has won a little more time to consider the implications of such a move. It is clear that the NHS, like all other public services, faces savage cuts in funding – another story – but surely it cannot be helped by throwing it in to the arena of competition and commissioning. As things stand there is no legal requirement to outsource, NHS Gloucestershire could reconsider its options and decide to remain in house.

Now, we know where Mark Harper stands. He has expressed his views in the local press and written to many of us personally. But what about the Health Forum, where is their public statement? What about Forest of Dean District Council; so far no statement from them. And what about the local Labour Party? They did grant our request to debate the issue and passed a motion opposing the transfer of services from the NHS to the Social Enterprise. That was before October 1. Since then no public statement and no signs of joining in the campaign. Would it be cynical to suggest that the thinking was that passing a motion of opposition would never require a follow up. Not so. This is a serious matter, there is much opposition throughout the county and a legal challenge is under way.

Come on all you committee people. Time to speak up. If you oppose the transfer and support the legal challenge then show some support for the campaign. If you support the handing over of services to the Social Enterprise then please tell us why. Silence should not be an option.

Diana Gash

Coleford