I was amazed at the complacency shown by Coun Tina Funnell (Who do doctors actually serve, Letters, January 18), in which she suggests that patients "should get in touch with their GP or the local medical committee and ask if they can have a patients' forum so that they can listen to patients and carers about the services they want".

Talk about Do It Yourself - what does she think the health scrutiny committee is for?

Asking patients to contact their GP or local medical committee like this seems a pretty shameless way to disown the committee's responsibilities.

Isn't the first duty for any chair of such a committee to call in the relevant health professionals and require them to account for their actions?

Clearly, the patients' forum she mentions should be organised by the committee, after the health service managers involved have appeared before it to explain themselves.

Readers will probably wonder why the health scrutiny committee chair wrote such a letter and ended it by praising the Government for the sums of money that it has invested.

Surely the committee should be looking instead at whether that investment is producing the right services, whether those services give value for money and whether they meet residents' needs. Because most of us still see many failings that the committee could usefully investigate.

It seems to me York's health scrutiny committee chair has little wish to hold health service bodies to account.

Maybe Coun Funnell should remind herself of the purposes of the committee and what it is intended to achieve.

What York's citizens need is an impartial, objective committee, which will help establish their real needs and do its best to ensure our health service bodies deliver appropriate services.

Perhaps it is time for Coun Funnell to change direction and to make sure that this committee does just that.

Ian Cuthbertson, Former chair, health scrutiny committee, City of York Council, Plainville Lane, Wigginton, York.