MADAM — Through your columns, I would like to ask our MP, Neil Carmichael to speak out against TTIP, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, agreement currently being negotiated between the US and Europe.

If the agreement goes through, it will mean that there will never again be the possibility of the NHS being owned by the British state.

It will mean that multinational companies will have the right to bid for all government spending.

They will also be able to sue for compensation if attempts are made to introduce measures that will affect their profits, like increasing the minimum wage.

The TTIP will have a devastating effect on our lives destroying so many of the hard-won rights that protect us as individuals and in the workplace.

Please, Mr Carmichael, speak up.

Diana Basterfield

Stroud