There can be few things more distressing than having a child with a brain tumour; the tumour can be difficult to treat and the treatment itself can have a devastating effect on the child.

The charity, Brain Tumour UK (which now incorporates the Joseph Foote Trust) helps to fund a great deal of research at Nottingham University and needs funding for a new piece of research which will allow doctors to be able to tell which children will respond to Chemotherapy and Radiotherapy and which children will not. This will spare some of the children the terrible ordeal of the treatments and is a huge step forward.

I have been asked to assist with the fundraising, which requires £100,000 to be raised before the end of December, with the University matching this amount. I will be one of 20 individuals who have pledged to raise £5000 and the reason I am writing to you is to ask for your help.

My fundraising efforts will be in the form of a sponsored weight loss and my aim is to lose fifty pounds of surplus weight before December 15th. In order to convince you that I am serious I will start the pot with £500 personally and will undertake that if I fail to hit the target of a fifty pound loss by December 15th I will add another £5000 personally to the total.

Embarrassment prevents me from giving you my starting weight but my referee will be my wife Janet, who will use readings from a scales which, through the magic of Wi-Fi, posts my weight readings to a program on my personal computer. My intention is to keep all supporters up to date monthly with my progress. My starting date is Tues 8 May 2012.

It would be great if you feel you could support this effort and I would be extremely grateful for donations of any size towards the target; I would like to collect donations as we go along and undertake to refund any supporters should I not reach the target. In addition as I have stated above I will contribute £5000 if I do not reach my target.

Please give generously, this is a very worthwhile cause.