Reform UK was last night accused of having ‘no plan’ for Britain after its deputy leader Richard Tice said it would scrap new high-speed rail schemes if elected
Reform UK was last night accused of having “no plan” for Britain after its deputy leader said it would scrap new high-speed rail schemes if elected.
Richard Tice told companies considering bidding for contracts to build Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) they should “not bother” as the party would “spend the money instead on things the country needs more”.
NPR is a proposal to boost east-west rail connections across northern England. Labour is expected to make a commitment to NPR in the coming weeks.
Responding to Mr Tice, a Labour spokesman said: “Yet again Reform have said what they’re against but have no plan for delivering what they’re supposedly in favour of. They don’t know. Only Labour is investing in rail, connecting communities across the North and delivering the modern transport system Britain needs.”
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Mr Tice, who made his comments in a forward to a report by centre-right think tank Policy Exchange, linked the “political obsession with high-speed rail” with how politics is “estranged, in so many ways, from ordinary voters’ real wishes and needs”.
He went on: “Even as the historic disaster of HS2 blows through more billions in overspending and more years of delay, even as it sucks money from things the country actually needs, even as taxes on people and business rise, ministers are about to commit to further high-speed rail schemes which could make HS2’s problems and price-tag look trivial.”
He added: “To anyone tempted to bid for the Liverpool-Manchester high speed scheme, or the revived northern leg of HS2, I give this warning: do not bother. A Reform government will spend the money instead on things the country needs more.
“That is the choice: tens of billions freed to spend on conventional rail and roads that help ordinary folk get to work – or another two decades of failure and waste.”
The Policy Exchange document predicted NPR would be an “even greater train crash” than HS2, as a new line between Liverpool and Manchester could cost £30billion.
It comes after Keir Starmer last night(MON) told Labour MPs: “If we want transport infrastructure so people can get to work and businesses can thrive, we have to fight for it.”
Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester, said: “Mr Tice and Mr Farage are both creatures of the London establishment and so I am not surprised in the slightest to hear Reform make the argument for a second-class railway for the north of England.
“Across Europe, every other country connects its big cities by modern high-speed rail but, like the Conservatives before them, the Reform party seems to believe that this should be a privilege only conferred on the southern half of the UK. We have higher ambitions for the North than them.”
A DfT spokesperson said: “The North has been stuck with second-rate transport for too long, leaving communities cut off and holding back growth.
“The Government is delivering the transport infrastructure needed for faster and more reliable journeys to create jobs and deliver stronger growth – such as the Transpennine Route Upgrade which is already delivering more efficient journeys between Manchester, Huddersfield, Leeds and York. We will set out our ambitions for Northern Powerhouse Rail in the near future.”
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