I WAS surprised to G Walton's letter (You Say, November 19) in which he gives the impression that Peter Luff has been active in supporting the Headteachers' Forum in their efforts to get more cash for Worcestershire's schools, while Worcester's MP Mike Foster has been negative and unsupportive.

He then says that following Mr Luff's speech in Parliament on November 6 that Mike Foster had a "sudden change of heart" due to bad publicity.

This is an extraordinary allegation. Whoever G Walton is, he can't be a regular reader of your newspaper or he would have known that, back in September, you reported that Mike Foster, along with Jacqui Smith, the MP for Redditch, had contacted more than 20,000 parents in the county to ask them to sign letters calling for fairer education funding for Worcestershire.

Our MP has been working hard lobbying the Minister for more money for our children for a long time, and if anyone has had a change of heart and decided to jump on a bandwagon to gain publicity, it is Peter Luff.

I'd also like to remind people why Worcestershire is in this dire position. In 1991 the Conservative government capped education funding and then created a formula of percentage increases that led to the ever-widening gap between us and other authorities. Why has it taken him 10 years to speak up?

ANDREW WATSON,

Hylton Road, Worcester.