Bradford Northern Powerhouse Rail station plan axed again, No 10 says

Bradford had hoped for a new station as part of a Northern Powerhouse Rail high-speed line

Plans for a new high-speed railway station in Bradford have been axed, Downing Street has said.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has shelved predecessor Liz Truss's promise to build the station on a proposed line connecting Liverpool and Hull.

Ms Truss said last month she would reverse a decision to curtail the Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) project.

But Mr Sunak is to scale back the project as he looks to find £50bn in savings, No 10 confirmed.

The prime minister's official spokesman indicated he would revert to a watered-down version of the NPR scheme announced by Boris Johnson last November, and would abandon "any additional commitments" made during his predecessor's short term in No 10.

Under the pared-back scheme, known as the Integrated Rail Plan, proposals for a new high-speed line from Manchester to Leeds and a later extension from Liverpool to Hull would be replaced with an upgrade of the existing track.

"The government is of the view that this approach will deliver those benefits sooner than under alternative plans," the spokesman said.

Business Secretary Grant Shapps told the BBC: "The line itself can deliver a 33-minute journey from Manchester to Leeds, quadruple nearly the capacity of that line, and do so without having to wait an extra 20 years beyond the delivery of what the upgrade can do.

"There wasn't really much point in going and blasting new tunnels through the Pennines."

'A backward step'

Northern leaders accused the government of breaking promises to improve transport connections between cities in Yorkshire and the North West.

Bradford Council leader Susan Hinchcliffe said: "We've got a plan for clean growth in Bradford and it includes a new station on an electrified line which connects us better to the rest of the North of England.

"I fail to see why any rational government, interested in promoting growth, wouldn't be interested in working with Bradford to deliver this plan which would provide for 27,000 jobs and a £3 billion annual uplift to the economy."

West Yorkshire Mayor Tracy Brabin said it would be a "backward step not to build Northern Powerhouse Rail in full with a stop in Bradford".

"The government's constant dither and delay is costing our regional economy almost £2 billion per year," she added.

Analysis - Spencer Stokes, business correspondent, BBC Look North

Forget the last two months ever happened.

Bradford is back where it was in the summer - facing up to the prospect of being isolated from the new high-speed rail line across the North known as Northern Powerhouse Rail.

Before her brief premiership hit the buffers, Liz Truss had suggested the original plan to build a brand new railway all the way from Liverpool to Hull via Bradford was government policy again.

Faced with a financial black hole to fill, it seems the scheme announced last November is the one Rishi Sunak's government will proceed with. It envisages a new high-speed railway from Warrington to Manchester and then on to Marsden on the western edge of West Yorkshire. It'll then merge into the current trans-Pennine route that runs via Huddersfield.

The government says trans-Pennine journey times will be cut, money will be saved and the project will be delivered sooner.

But Bradford will feel it has been jilted once again. And it remains Labour Party policy to connect the city to the high-speed network.

Shadow transport secretary Louise Haigh accused the government of having "crashed the economy" and making "northern communities pay the price".

"A lost decade of broken Tory promises has left the North with second-rate infrastructure, and rail services in crisis, holding the economy back," the Labour MP for Sheffield Heeley said.

"Rishi Sunak told voters he would deliver Northern Powerhouse Rail, before abandoning it at the first opportunity."

Shadow transport secretary Louise Haigh condemned government plans to "abandon" the project

Steve Rotheram, Mayor of the Liverpool City Region, said: "This news doesn't come as a surprise, because it is exactly what myself and other leaders across the North have been claiming and campaigning so vigorously to avoid.

"The government has continually reneged on promises to connect Liverpool and other great Northern cities - leaving ordinary people cut off from accessing work, education, training opportunities - and each other."

A report last year found Bradford had the worst rail connections of any major British city.