WE have always had great difficulty in understanding how Richard Neale came to be employed as a consultant gynaecologist at The Friarage Hospital in Northallerton.

The emergence of new evidence today, supporting the view that Mr Neale should never have been employed in this country, is certain to fuel the anger of those who feel badly let down by the NHS in this disturbing saga.

Campaigners who have battled tirelessly - with this paper's support - to expose the truth, have discovered that those who gave Mr Neale his job in North Yorkshire were in breach of guidelines provided by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

According to those guidelines, consultants should have been accredited to the RCOG but Mr Neale, who had been struck off in Canada for the deaths of two patients, was not.

Had his employers done their job thoroughly and checked Mr Neale's credentials properly, a great deal of suffering could have been avoided.

It is our view that those involved in the appointment of Richard Neale, and in giving him a pay-off and reference to move on to another English hospital, acted disgracefully.

But nearly 20 years after his appointment, no one has been censured in any way.

How can that possibly be right?

TODAY we begin a series of special reports in the build up to the 60th anniversary of D-Day - the day that changed the world.

We have been back to France with veterans from the North-East who played their part with such incredible courage.

They include Sergeant Charles Eagles, of the 9th Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry, whose astonishing D-Day diary is serialised in The Northern Echo over the next fortnight.

It is a story which everyone should read - both young and old - because it is a rare account of human sacrifice which must never be forgotten.