Manchester business leaders slam Government for creating doubt over future of HS2

Manchester business leaders have slammed comments from Defence Secretary Grant Shapps that suggested the Government is reviewing the future of the HS2 rail leg to the city.

Mr Shapps said on Sunday that the Government was “absolutely right” to review the soaring costs of the £71bn project, adding that a decision on the future of the Manchester section would be taken “in due course”.

In a broad condemnation of the Government’s position on the scheme, Professor Juergen Maier, vice-chairman of Northern Powerhouse Partnership, told i: “The Government is right to want to deliver value for money to the taxpayer but given that the northern sections of the route deliver the biggest return on investment according to its own calculations, the decision to scrap it doesn’t add up.

“The business community has been very clear about the devastating impact this would have on investor confidence in the UK. We hope the Prime Minister will listen to our concerns.”

Mr Maier, who is a former UK chief executive of technology and industrial giant Siemens, added that Mr Shapps was “wrong to say HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail are independent of each other”.

“The two schemes are part of one network, sharing the most valuable stretch of the route between Manchester airport and Manchester Piccadilly,” he said.

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“It is also wrong to paint this as a binary choice between HS2 and local schemes. Building a new line kills two birds with one stone because creating capacity on our rail network improves links between towns as well as between cities.”

Manchester’s leading nightlife entrepreneur also criticised the Government’s position, claiming “it makes a joke of the Conservative’s claim on levelling up the country”.

Sacha Lord, the co-creator of the Parklife festival and owner of the super-club Warehouse, added: “You’ve got the Government talking about one of their main agendas being levelling up, and it’s just simply not the case. This is the perfect example of that.

“Businesses were promised that HS2 would come to Manchester, and that’s why many came to the city.”

Mr Shapps said the Government could not write an “open-ended cheque” if costs were “inexorably going higher and higher”.

He suggested it would be “crazy” not to have another look at the scheme following the inflation shock triggered by the war in Ukraine and the transport shifts following the coronavirus pandemic.

“I think the sequencing of what happens next is a perfectly legitimate question,” he told BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg.

Mr Lord, who is also a night time economy adviser to Labour’s Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham, added: “How can the Government invest so much money and make so many promises to businesses that HS2 was coming to Manchester and now it’s very clear from what Grant Shapps has said that this is off the table and not happening.

“It’s disgusting.”

The eight times Grant Shapps has backed HS2 leg to Manchester

Despite casting doubt on the future phase two of the rail line during Sunday’s political shows, former transport secretary Grant Shapps had previously been fully behind the scheme.

Here’s what he said about the project earlier:

“HS2’s business case has been founded on increasing capacity on our constrained rail network, improving connectivity, and stimulating economic growth and regeneration.” 3 September 2019

“Investing in transport links is essential to levelling up access to opportunities across the country, ensuring our regions are better connected, local economies flourish and more than half a century of isolation undone.” 28 January 2020

“We are going to complete HS2.” 28 May 2021

“If you think about other railway lines that were built 150 years ago – the West Coast and the East Coast main lines – not two world wars, not recessions and depressions, not the Spanish flu, none of these things stopped the inexorable growth in the need for people and goods to travel.” 7 July 2021

“One of the biggest single acts of levelling up in history.” 18 November 2021

“We are determined to improve transport connections and level up communities across the country, and this bill marks a landmark moment as we bring HS2 to Manchester and lay the foundations for Northern Powerhouse Rail.” 24 January 2022

“The advantages are enormous. I cite Liverpool as an example where journey times from Manchester will be slashed dramatically.” 27 April 2022

“We are getting on with delivering, as promised, better, faster and more reliable trains, and they are going to get there sooner as well.” 8 December 2022

The doubt around the future of HS2 was also criticised by a leading business group.

Alex Veitch, director of policy at the British Chambers of Commerce, said: “If the Government further reneges on its plans for HS2, then it will shatter business confidence, both in the UK and among overseas investors, in its ability to see large scale construction infrastructure projects through.

“If speculation is allowed to grow unchecked, and the project is further delayed or cut back, then there is a real danger that this growth will wither on the vine.”

Costs for HS2 have spiralled in recent years. The planned railway is intended to link London, the Midlands and the North of England but has been plagued by delays and rising costs, with calls from Tory MPs for the entire project to be scrapped.

A budget of £55.7bn for the whole of HS2 was set in 2015, which excluded the cancelled eastern leg from the West Midlands to the East Midlands, but it has ballooned to around £71bn today.

The Confederation of British Industry, which lobbies on behalf on some of the largest UK businesses, refused to comment on the doubts over the future of phase two of the project.

A spokeswoman said: “We are not commenting until we get the official announcement”.