SIR – This Government, like all Governments since 1979, just can’t help themselves tinkering – for political gain rather than public benefit – with perhaps the last, but now heavily-tarnished, jewel in our country’s crown – the NHS.

Now our GPs have been given unprecedented powers, through GP Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs).

If you have an appointment to see your doctor, do please ask him about this and how they will ensure the NHS is protected in the context of the huge undemocratic powers they will now have.

While we still put a great deal of trust in our doctors, and generally rightly so, people should remember that they are not public servants, but private contractors to the NHS, who have largely, since the formation of the NHS, dictated to Government their own worth. A bit like medical insider trading!

Let your common sense prevail and write to your surgery to ask how they will act to protect the NHS, and put it first, rather than profits of private companies, including the robbery of the public purse by pharmaceutical companies, among others, who are more interested in a small minority of shareholders dividends, rather than public health and well being.

James Paton, Southfield Terrace, Skipton