I waited until the final day to submit my response to the consultation so that I could have the benefit of reading the many expert ones copied to me.

Clearly we have a huge fight on our hands, but the reaction of local people has been fantastic.  I have never known a petition on any local issue to receive such support.

I have sent a copy of my submission to the Secretary of State and together with colleague MPs am seeking a meeting with him.  Please click here to read my submission in full.

On Wednesday 12th December 2012 I took part in an Opposition Day Debate on NHS Funding.  I took the opportunity to air my views on the restructuring of the NHS in South London and the proposed closure of the A&E and Maternity Services at Lewisham Hospital in my constituency.

I reminded Jeremy Hunt MP, Secretary of State for Health, that when David Cameron was in Opposition he named Lewisham as one of the 29 hospitals he would personally defend.  Lewisham is a successful, solvent and highly regarded hospital.  120,000 people use the A&E department each year, and more than 4000 babies are born in the maternity unit.  It is crazy that our borough should be forced to lose these excellent services. 

My colleague Heidi Alexander MP (Lewisham East) also took part in the debate.  You can view our contributions below (my speech begins at 14:59:50 and Heidi's begins at 3:58:28).

This morning Heidi Alexander (MP for Lewisham East), Jim Dowd (MP for Lewisham West & Penge) and I delivered copies of the petitions to save Lewisham A&E and Maternity Services to Downing Street. We were accompanied by many of Lewisham's dedicated local campaigners

At the time of writing more than 22,000 people have signed the online petition.  If you have not already done so, the petition can be found here.

We also delivered a petition signed by more than 300 Lewisham doctors, as well as another signed by over 650 GPs and healthcare workers from across South East London.

The deadline for responding to the consultation is midnight on 13th December.