By Dr Brian Iddon MP Bolton South East IT has been a privilege to serve the people of the Bolton South East Constituency for the last four years.

Although I have been involved in politics for most of my life, I did not accurately anticipate the complexity and demands of my present job! We have dealt with thousands of people. It hasn't always been possible to deliver the solutions expected by some people. Nevertheless, the work has been mainly successful and always interesting!

A number of your readers have sent in letters discussing the voting records and attendance of Bolton's three Labour Members of Parliament in the House of Commons. The three of us bring to Parliament quite different interests. The fact that my voting record is one of the best in Westminster doesn't mean that I am sitting on my backside doing nothing, as implied by Dorothy Brady in a recent letter (BEN: April 28). In fact, I challenge this lady to come down and shadow any MP, I think she would get a surprise, as would our other critics!

Ministers and their Parliamentary Private Secretaries are often away on other duties, and their attendances in the lobbies will be fewer than for the rest of us. Other Members are away on Council of Europe and other international business. The Government has to maintain a good majority in the lobbies in order to get its business through.

All MPs help to shape policy; we attend a lot of meetings to do that. The policy is actually decided by all our Party Members through a process of policy fora, which are held in between General Elections, and that is how it should be. I am a member of three back-bench Labour Party Departmental Committees -- Education and Employment, Environment, Transport and the Regions, and Health and Social Security -- which meet regularly to discuss implementation of policy.

I would be happy to send any of my constituents, on request, a full list of the Committees that I attend, a list of the contributions which I make on the floor of the House of Commons, or my monthly diary, all of which I send to our Party Members on a monthly basis.

To receive any of this information, for advice, or details of my Advice Surgeries (I will continue these during the General Election campaign, although not as your MP) please contact Karen on 01204 371202 (see also: http://members.nbci.com/iddon).