Transport Connectivity: North-west England
Debate between Jerome Mayhew and Andrew Murrison(2 weeks, 2 days ago)
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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—
