The government’s Integrated Rail Plan, published on Thursday, is in fact neither integrated nor a plan. If it had truly contained an integrated approach, it would have addressed national rail needs as a whole. It would have confirmed Boris Johnson’s election promise to build both the north-south HS2 line in full and the west-east Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR). It would then have committed to upgrading the remaining rail network to provide fast and regular urban connections and commuter services, especially in the north. It would also have contained a proper strategy for enticing goods services back on to rail and away from the roads.
Instead, Grant Shapps unveiled what is, in reality, a cost-cutting exercise. It has been dictated by the Treasury’s refusal to allow public infrastructure spending to exceed 3% of gross domestic product. Under this self-imposed fiscal rule, rail is competing with green investment, broadband, hospitals, schools and even space rocketry for new capital spend – and, as Thursday’s document proves, it is losing out. As a result, the transport secretary has abandoned the eastern leg of HS2 along with major parts of the trans-Pennine NPR project – while going through ludicrous presentational contortions to avoid saying so. In their place, announced with a brass neck that even Mr Johnson would have struggled to equal, the transport secretary trumpeted a cobbled-together set of cheaper upgrades and short-term fixes as if they add up to a better deal than the axed projects they replace.
This is, quite simply, untrue. Underlying it is the reality of the UK’s unequal regional investment. Figures from the IPPR North thinktank show that, in the past decade, the north of England received £349 per person in transport spending, while London got £864. If the north had received the same level of spending as London, it would have had £86bn more since 2010. Mr Shapps’ plan, worth £96bn, will take until 2050 to complete – which is 29 years away and more distant than the planned completion of the original full HS2 in the 2040s. The new money will therefore perpetuate regional investment inequalities, not remove them. It does not level up but level down.
Lost opportunities are legion. The eastern leg of HS2 has been scrapped, but there will still be a high-speed link between Birmingham and East Midlands, a significant part of the original route. At the same time, there is potential provision for another new HS2 route between Leeds and Sheffield – but only part of it involving a possible new dedicated line - as well as an upgrade , part of the proposed electrification of the Midlands mainline, between Sheffield and East Midlands. In other words, the eastern leg will be half-built, with a gap in the middle.
Something similar is proposed for the NPR, with new track between Warrington and Huddersfield, but only upgrades between Warrington and Liverpool and between Huddersfield and York. Freight rail opportunities, with their huge environmental benefits, are barely discussed. This is not a joined-up railway and it is not joined-up government either.
These proposals mark a loss of governmental nerve about important rail infrastructure. But they are also a reality check about its airy promises on both levelling up and building back better. They seem to recognise that the next general election will not now fall into the Conservatives’ lap. Caught between a spending-averse Treasury, and the fear that new Tory voters in the north and Midlands want a quicker pre-election payback if they are not to revert to Labour, Mr Johnson has ordered a retreat from ambition. He hopes all this will give him room for general election handouts and more warm words. But it is evidence that his words and promises are not to be trusted.
• This article was amended on 25 November 2021 because an earlier version said there would be “another new line between Leeds and Sheffield”. It is more accurately described as the potential provision of a new HS2E route between the two cities.
