CONSERVATIVE conference came off the rails today as a massive row over scrapping HS2 blew up as the Chancellor took to the stage.
Jeremy Hunt’s big speech was overshadowed by claims the PM will use his own address on Wednesday to announce the Manchester leg of the bungled rail project will be axed.
PAMayor of the West Midlands Andy Street speaks to the media about HS2 during the Conservative Party annual conference in Manchester[/caption]
GettyTory conference was plunged into chaos as it was confirmed that the Manchester leg of HS2 will be scrapped while Jeremy Hunt delivered his keynote speech[/caption]
But last night the Tory Mayor of Birmingham threatened to resign on the steps of the main conference hotel, telling the PM: “I won’t let HS2 go without a fight.”
He added: “If you tell the international investment community you are going to do something, you bloody well have to stick to your word”.
And he repeatedly refused to rule out quitting if the plug was pulled.
Meanwhile Labour Mayor of Manchester Andy Burnham said that axing the northern leg of HS2 would be the “desperate act of a dying government”.
No10 insisted “no final decision” had been made last night – but Hunt’s spokesman let slip an announcement by the PM was imminent.
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He told reporters: “It’s not the Treasury’s announcement… it’s for the Prime Minister.”
Earlier in the day the Chancellor himself said: “I do have to answer the question as to why it costs 10 times more to build a railway in this country than just across the Channel in France.”
Confronted by The Sun’s revelation HS2 has 167 PR workers, he said some of the project’s spending was “totally unacceptable.”
The PM is poised to drastically scale back the flagship rail line to rein in the eye-watering costs.
Neither the Chancellor nor Transport Secretary Mark Harper mentioned the future of HS2 in their conference speeches despite continued reports that it would be cut.
A package appeared to have been signed off by Chancellor Jeremy Hunt on Monday amid suggestions the pill could be sweetened by improvements for northern infrastructure.
An expanded Northern Powerhouse Rail project linking northern cities and fresh cash for potholes and bus routes could be announced to soften the blow.
But the drastic cost-cutting exercise amid suggestions the price-tag has spiralled past £100 billion could also see HS2 end at Old Oak Common in the capital’s western suburbs.
However Mr Sunak has been hit by a massive backlash – with Boris Johnson, Theresa May and George Osborne all queuing up to urge him to think again.
Birmingham’s Mayor Mr Street made an impassioned last-ditch appeal last night to bring in the private sector to finish the railway to ease the pressure on taxpayers.
He told a hastily convened press conference: “You will be turning your back on an opportunity to level up – a once-in-a-generation opportunity,” he told reporters at the conference.
“You will indeed be damaging your international reputation as a place to invest.”
And Manchester’s Andy Burnham described the axing as “profoundly depressing”.
The mayor said: “This will be remembered as the conference when they pulled the plug on us.
“What gives them the right to treat people here in Greater Manchester and the north of England as second-class citizens?
And amidst the bickering about railways, ex-PM Liz Truss popped up to slam Hunt and Sunak’s agenda.
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“We need to acknowledge is government is too big, taxes are too high and we are spending too much,” she said to rousing applause on the conference fringes.
She urged the ministers to “unleash their inner Conservative” and build more houses and green-light fracking.
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