Sir - It doesn't happen often, but I find myself agreeing with Nick Clegg, who on being asked during an interview this morning, said that he felt the authorities had been heavy handed in dealing with the issue of Ashya King's removal from hospital by his parents.

He is quite right. What possible good can it do for this poor, sick, vulnerable lad to be stuck in hospital on his own, whilst his parents languish in jail.

For what? If reports are believed to be true, for simply trying to find the best possible treatment for their son.

I have a lot of sympathy for them as I found myself, albeit as an adult, in a similar position 10 years ago when seeking treatment for breast cancer.

Hospitals here wouldn't listen, and then refused to release my records so that I could go elsewhere.

I ended up camping out in the hospital, and threatened with arrest because I refused to leave without my notes.

At that time going abroad for treatment was the best possible decision I could have made.

What is more likely to be the case here, as initially there were the usual cries of fear for his health, the danger his parents were putting him in, and the likelihood of his feeding tube battery running out, was that the hospital concerned were trying to cover themselves against possible claims of negligence.

In the wake of the woeful inadequacies exposed by the authorities in Rotherham in protecting the young girls there from harm, we now witness an unseemly scrabble to action, where common sense should have prevailed.

LINDA PIGGOTT-VIJEH, Combe St. Nicholas