The BBC Panorama special on July 13 about private sector firms providing services under the NHS criticised the scheme because such firms would be able to channel publicly-funded business to themselves.

There is already a major Government-funded initiative that operates exactly this way - it is called Warm Front.

The Warm Front programme spearheads the Government's strategy to fight fuel poverty through Defra (the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs).

It provides Government grants of up to £4,000 for low-income households to improve the energy efficiency of their homes. A second scheme provides a £300 cash rebate to anyone over 60 for new or improved central heating.

Warm Front is operated under exclusive Government contract by Newcastle-based firm eaga.

The company's 2007 annual report shows that on total revenue of £482m, it made a loss of £87m, principally because £104m was distributed to employees when the firm was successfully floated on the London Stock Exchange.

A total of £359m of revenue (75 per cent) was Government funded (£123m private sector).

In 2006, the top four executives received a total of about £3m compensation. The same year, an outgoing executive director's payoff was £1,270,000.

At the 2007 flotation, the chief executive and three executives were granted a total of five million ordinary shares worth more than £10m.

The more one digs, the murkier it gets. Research suggests few people in Oxfordshire have benefited from Warm Front. The company withholds such information, and Defra has also stonewalled.

Is the Government taking the NHS in the same direction of enriching its providers while keeping its performance hidden from the public who fund it?

GRAHAM JONES Customer Service Manager Steve Cross Plumbing & Heating Oxford