I WAS utterly shocked to read your story “Fears for future of maternity services” (Echo, May 17) about the centralisation of services by the County Durham and Darlington Foundation Trust.

No one has been consulted over such a huge change. This arouses our worst fears and suspicions about the current NHS agenda. It is worth remembering that there have already been times this year when not a single paediatric bed has been available in the NorthEast.

It is also worth pointing out that in the draft Northern Sustainability and Transformation Plan (to which Durham City belongs) reference is made to very substandard maternity services in the area – they are on a par with the developing world. Surely the trust should be striving to improve services, not to make them worse.

I hope that this is not the shape of things to come.

People need to be aware that recruitment is at crisis point and, of course, this must have something to do with the fact that pay has been held back for so long.

This Tory government is well on its way to complete privatisation of the NHS. It is sad to see actions like this being undertaken in the heated partisan atmosphere of an election campaign.

I assume that there will be room for a discussion of this bombshell at the Joint Trust/Council of Governors on May 24.

Carole Reeves, Public Governor (Durham City), Keep Our NHS Public Durham