A CANCER sufferer who had to pay for his own treatment has told Conservative leader Michael Howard he will never vote Labour again.

Bob Norburn was speaking during an exclusive question time session between Mr Howard and Manchester Evening News readers at the Midland Hotel.

The M.E.N. revealed in December how Mr Norburn, 57, was told by health bosses in Bolton they would not fund a life-saving prostate cancer treatment that cost '8,000.

He has since had the procedure in a Sunderland hospital and is currently all-clear. Mr Norburn says he has been told he will get the cash back, but so far hasn't seen a penny.

Mr Norburn, a lifelong Labour voter, told the Tory leader he had been suffering from "Tony Blaired vision" - but would never back the party again.

"I am absolutely disgusted that after eight years there are still excuses," he said. "I have never been on the dole in 30 years, have never sent in a sick note in 25 years. I have cost my country nothing. I have paid, in income and purchase tax, well over a million pounds.

"Since I was 18 years old I have voted Labour. I come from Wigan and it is dyed-in-the-wool. But that is the last time I'm voting Labour. I have had enough of Tony Blaired vision."

A clearly-moved Mr Howard said "great" when Mr Norburn said he was now cancer-free. And when Mr Norburn said Britain should have the best health system in the world, the Tory leader echoed: "Absolutely."

Mr Howard told Mr Norburn he should not have had to pay for the procedure, adding: "We have a National Health Service and I believe it should be a truly national health service.

"Patients should have the right to go to any NHS hospital in the country, not at the behest of a primary care trust but at the behest of their GP. Your GP would have been able to send you to that hospital completely free of charge."

During the hour-long session, Mr Howard fielded questions on everything from the euro to student debt.

He said '35bn savings on Government red tape and waste would allow him to put 2,271 extra police on the streets of Greater Manchester and consider putting up the wage-level at which people start paying income tax as part of a '4bn tax-cut package.

But he warned his audience: "I don't have a magic wand. Taxpayers don't have a bottomless pit of money."

Mr Howard said he "very much hoped" his party would be able to pay for the Metrolink extension, but added that he wasn't prepared to make promises while in opposition.

He confirmed his party would not introduce 24-hour drink licences until the problem of binge-drinking had been addressed in cities like Manchester.

"The city centre of Manchester has been transformed and now is a vibrant, exciting and lively place which a lot of people want to visit, but a lot of people who want to visit on a Friday night do not come here because they are frightened of getting caught up in some binge drinking violence," he said.

"That is a dreadful thing."

Mr Howard said that if he was about anything, he was about choice. And he called for a British version of the "American dream" - the idea that someone can follow president Abraham Lincoln from a lowly log cabin to the White House if hard-working and talented enough.

Mr Howard said that sort of social journey was actually more likely in Britain than across the Atlantic."But we don't talk it much," he said. "I want everyone to have the opportunity for what I call the British Dream."

Click on the links below to listen to part of the debate.