Transport Connectivity: North-west England

Jerome Mayhew Excerpts

Wednesday 19th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Jerome Mayhew (Broadland and Fakenham) (Con)]

It is lovely to see you in the Chair, Dr Murrison. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Leigh and Atherton (Jo Platt) for securing the debate, and congratulate all hon. Members, who have put very forceful cases for transport in the north-west. Their combined contributions have demonstrated that there are many shared problems in the region.

I do not have time to mention every hon. Member who has contributed, so I will limit myself to commenting on the contribution of the hon. Member for Leigh and Atherton, who highlighted that her constituency, like I suspect many others in the area, is a post-industrial commuter belt that is struggling to cope with the consequential increase in traffic. Because of the over-reliance on cars, the society suffers from high transport-related social exclusion. There are a number of issues, but I will try to mash them together into three headlines.

Let us start with the positive news, which is the welcome devolution of transport policy. It was implemented by Andy Burnham, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, but it was of course a Conservative policy that was brought in in 2017, so while we welcome it, we should share the plaudits. I welcome the success of the Bee network, but we have to recognise that it was expensive—there was £1 billion of Government support.

That raises a big issue, because as well as that £1 billion, Bee is supported by considerably north of £130 million a year from central funds, by my calculations. Its parent, as it were—Transport for London—receives in excess of £1 billion a year. There is therefore a fundamental question here for the Minister. The Bus Services (No. 2) Bill is going through the House of Lords, and I have with me the consultation on Great British Railways and “A railway fit for Britain’s future”. If this is the model for the future, can the Minister shed some light on where the increased funding will come from? It is a good development—it was Conservative policy—but where it is expanded beyond the large mayoral combined authorities to other combined authorities, there will inevitably be an associated cost.

The second related issue is the potential conflict when regional policy butts up against national policy, when a strong regional mayor rightly wants control over a combined transport policy, whether that is buses, rail or road. We potentially have a directing mind under Great British Railways—intended to be one of its key benefits—coming up against Andy Burnham, for example. The consultation paper refers to that, but has no detail on how those potential conflicts will be resolved and who will be the final arbiter. Perhaps the Minister will take the opportunity to respond on that.

Many hon. Members called for the reintroduction of the northern HS2 extension, focusing not on speed, but on capacity. We have to recognise that, again, it comes back to money. The cancellation of the northern part of HS2 redirected £19.8 billion to other transport projects for the region. This is not a comprehensive list, but it gives a flavour: £2 billion for the new station at Bradford and a new connection to Manchester; £3 billion for upgraded and electrified lines from Manchester to Sheffield, Sheffield to Leeds, Sheffield to Hull and Hull to Leeds; about £4 billion of additional transport funding for the six city regions; £2.5 billion of additional funding for outside the city regions; and £3.3 billion for road improvements, albeit largely filling potholes.

[Mrs Russell]

I understand that in that announcement there was £180 million for Cheshire East council, but council leaders were told it would be weighted towards the back end of the seven years. They feel strongly that it was made-up money that was always predicated on borrowing, and that there was never any real intention to give that money to the north-west.

[Jerome Mayhew]

Their concerns were wrong. I had a minor position in the Treasury at the time, and I can assure the hon. Lady that that was genuine redirection of funds, albeit over a period, as one would expect, with the release of funds associated with the development of HS2 in the northern sector.

To conclude the list, we had £3.3 billion for road improvements and an additional £11.5 billion for Northern Powerhouse Rail from Manchester to Liverpool. The question that is easy to miss in opposition but impossible to avoid in government is this: where do the Government want money to be spent? That money could be used for those widespread improvements or be rediverted to a northern branch of a version of HS2, but it is impossible to spend the same money twice. If the Minister wants to do both, where is the money going to come from?

Finally, many hon. Members referred to the seeming disconnect between investment decisions in London and the south-east and elsewhere in the country, the north-west in particular. The hon. Member for Leigh and Atherton used a good phrase:

“Growth goes where the growth already is.”

The previous Government at least took the first step in tackling an injustice in the Green Book analysis. That was undertaken to unlock some of the levelling-up investment that the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) referred to. I am concerned that the new Government—certainly the new Treasury—are reverting to type. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer had her growth panic a few weeks ago—

[Dr Andrew Murrison (in the Chair)]

Order. I call the Minister.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Simon Lightwood)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Dr Murrison. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh and Atherton (Jo Platt) on raising the important topic of connectivity in the north-west—an area that was a cradle to so many transport innovations and is home to beautiful countryside and some of our greatest cities and towns. It is not quite Yorkshire, but it is still a pretty special place.

Kick-starting economic growth is the Government’s No. 1 mission, and the economic performance of the north-west is vital to successful delivery. It is essential that we deliver our plan for change to create more jobs, put more money in people’s pockets and help to rebuild Britain—but, as I am sure my hon. Friend recognises, we cannot have good growth without the transport connectivity to support it.

A truly connected transport network must be designed and built in collaboration with local leaders. That is why the English devolution White Paper published last year is so important. It is an opportunity to reset our relationship with local and sub-national government and to empower local leaders and mayors to make the right decisions for their communities. We are already seeing the benefits across mayoral areas with the introduction of the Bee network in Greater Manchester, alongside mayors in the Liverpool city region and West Yorkshire who are working towards taking back control of their buses. I will just put on the record how pleased I was to hear yesterday that South Yorkshire will also be taking back control of its buses.

The Government will be still more ambitious, however. First, we will make the process for taking buses back into public control faster and simpler through the Bus Services (No. 2) Bill. Secondly, we will give mayors a statutory role in governing, managing and planning the rail network, working alongside Great British Railways. Thirdly, through the English devolution Bill, we will put the roles of mayors on a primary footing, setting out a clear and broad set of powers that will be available to mayors and local leaders.

Our transport network has seen decades of decay. Communities have been cut off and short-changed. Fragmented networks have hindered meaningful change, and the state of our local roads is a result of past under-investment. We are determined to reverse that. An uplift of £200 million was secured at the autumn spending review for city region sustainable transport settlement areas for 2025-26, which was welcomed by the mayoral combined authorities, including Greater Manchester and the Liverpool city region, which are receiving over £1.7 billion from the current CRSTS programme.

The autumn Budget announcement also included a commitment of over £650 million in local transport funding in 2025-26 to ensure that transport connections improve in towns, villages and rural areas, and a funding uplift of £500 million for 2025-26 for highways maintenance. Of that £500 million, the north-west region is receiving over £64.8 million in additional funding. In the Budget the Government confirmed investment of over £1 billion to support and improve bus services and keep fares affordable. Local transport authorities across the north-west have been allocated nearly £150 million for the 2025-26 financial year.

The Government are committed to improving transport across the north, including boosting rail connectivity from east to west. We are already taking forward the trans-Pennine route upgrade—TRU—which will improve rail performance and support growth and housing by reducing journey times and providing more passenger services on the line between Manchester and York. We are delivering the Manchester taskforce programme, which is central to the Government’s ambitious multibillion-pound rail investment across the north. As announced in the autumn Budget, we are maintaining momentum on Northern Powerhouse Rail by progressing planning and design works to support its future delivery.

On our strategic road network we are developing a five-year third road investment strategy that will cover 2026 to 2031. The RIS will be published before the end of 2025. Our vision is for a network that connects more people to more places, making our day-to-day journeys easier and simpler, and building a network that can attract investment, whether that is through boosting efficiency or unlocking land for development.

The integrated national transport strategy will be published this year and will set a long-term vision for transport in England, focusing on how transport should be designed, built and operated to better serve all the people who use it and enable them to live fulfilling lives. We will develop the strategy through collaborative and open engagement with our stakeholders and people who use transport.

It is impossible for me to cover every point raised today, but I will touch on a few. On Northern Rail, it has been made really clear to Northern’s management that the current performance is not acceptable. That is why Rail North Partnership, through which the Department for Transport and Transport for the North jointly manage Northern’s contract, issued it with a notice of breach of contract, which has required Northern to produce a detailed plan to improve its services.

On HS2, transport is an essential part of our mission to rebuild Britain, and I am committed to delivering infrastructure that works for the whole country and of course to improving rail connectivity across the midlands and the north. My ministerial colleagues and I are carefully reviewing the position we have inherited on HS2 and wider rail infrastructure.

On the previous Government’s commitments on investment, I will just remind the hon. Member for Broadland and Fakenham (Jerome Mayhew) about the £22 billion black hole. They left this Government to pick up the pieces.

[Jerome Mayhew]

Will the Minister give way?

[Simon Lightwood]

I will not give way.

We acknowledge that rates of step-free access remain low across Great Britain, which is why the Access for All programme is working to address that. In the Greater Manchester area—