SHEILA Wright-Hogeland fervently wishes she had never heard of Richard Neale - but she is not about to give up on a campaign which has become a near-obsession. The former Cosmopolitan model has developed a steely determination to get to the truth after falling foul of the larger-than-life surgeon in the late 1980s.

After moving to an idyllic corner of North Yorkshire from London, Sheila decided to seek medical advice for a long-standing condition, endometriosis, an inflamation of the uterine lining which can cause infertility.

On the recommendation of her GP she went to see Mr Neale as a private patient in Northallerton.

"If I knew what I now know I would not have gone within 100,000 miles of that man," says Sheila, bitterly.

For six years, despite stabbing pains in her abdomen, Mr Neale assured her she was suffering from period pain.

Eventually, her condition become so acute she had to have a hysterectomy. Even then, she said, the rogue surgeon made a mess of the operation and she had to consult another gynaecologist.

Angry at the sub-standard treatment she had received at the hands of Mr Neale - who was working as an NHS consultant at The Friarage Hospital in Northallerton at that time - she began taking legal action.

She only realised the wider ramifications of the Richard Neale affair when she read about the growing number of complaints against the surgeon in The Northern Echo.

It led to her co-founding a support group for women who believed they had been damaged by Mr Neale.

Most of them were NHS patients who had complained to The Friarage about the surgeon's work.

Within a few months their membership was shooting up and they began a well-organised campaign to halt Mr Neale's chequered medical career.

In July 2000, two years after the campaign was launched, the former model and her colleagues were celebrating on the steps of the General Medical Council in London as Mr Neale was struck off the medical register.

The details of the GMC's official "determination" make grim reading.

THEY found Mr Neale guilty of 34 out of 35 allegations made against him and concluded: "The findings of fact reveal many deficiencies in the standard of care you provided to patients as well as unprofessional and dishonest behaviour."

Apart from lying about his qualifications, the surgeon's diagnostic skills and clinical management of patients "fell seriously below accepted standards".

At the end of a catalogue of errors which resulted in pain and discomfort for many of his female patients, the GMC ruled: "Given the serious and persistent nature of the findings against you, it is necessary for the protection of the public that your registration be suspended with immediate effect."

While Sheila takes great pleasure that the women stopped Mr Neale in his tracks she fears that the Government's decision to hold an "independent investigation" behind closed doors rather than a full-scale public inquiry will cover the tracks of senior officials and doctors who employed, defended and protected Mr Neale despite growing evidence that he was incompetent and a danger to his patients.

"This inquiry is not independent at all, it is going to be chaired by an NHS employee, a doctor. This is the NHS investigating the NHS," she says.

The group asked for a truly independent public inquiry, chaired by a judge or senior barrister, "someone completely unbiased and independent with a legal background," says Sheila, who believes the Government is in danger of repeating the mistake it made over the Harold Shipman inquiry.

Initially intended to be private, intense pressure forced the Goverment to open it up to the public.

She has no doubt that the woman who is to chair the investigation - Dr Bernadette Fuge, the National Assembly for Wales medical director - is highly competent.

But she would prefer someone from outside the health service and with legal training.

"The terms of this so-called investigation appear to encompass no more than an analysis of the hospital's complaints procedure and of how effective it was," she says.

"There is also no reference to the role of the GMC in the Neale debacle - this must be investigated," says Sheila, who is also concerned that there is no mention of the many private patients who make up about a quarter of her group.

"We still want an open, honest inquiry, held in public, into all of the circumstances surrounding the employment of Richard Neale in the UK," says Sheila, who is considering possible legal action to force the Government's hand.

Above all the group wants answers to the outstanding questions of how an incompetent and dishonest doctor who had been struck off the medical register in Canada after the death of patients was allowed to practise in the UK for 15 years.

"Why was he unleashed on unsuspecting patients in the UK, when both the GMC and the regional health authority employing him knew all about his horrendous history in Canada?" asks Sheila.

SHEILA believes that important questions remain why Mr Neale appeared to lead a charmed life during his 15 year UK career despite growing evidence of his incompetence.

"Why did his medical colleagues who witnessed the havoc he was causing chose to look the other way and why did nobody except one theatre nurse have the courage to blow the whistle on him?" she says.

Sheila says the seven questions posed by The Northern Echo the day after the GMC gave their verdict on Mr Neale remain unanswered.

She firmly believes that a public inquiry is the only way to get to the bottom of what is a long and murky tale.

"We want a public inquiry. We want all of those responsible for hiring this man, for failing to fire him when they should have, and for protecting him and putting patients' health at risk to be accountable. We want all these people questioned in the public arena, not behind closed doors, and made to answer for what they did."

Sheila says the 250 strong group is determined to challenge the format of the investigation, if necessary by taking legal action. For Sheila the job she started three years ago is unfinished.

"The so-called independent investigation makes a mockery of all the courage shown by Neale's victims. We must have a public inquiry" says Sheila