the times | Thursday November 25 2021 11News
Northern leaders will seek to pay part
of the cost of Northern Powerhouse
Rail, such is their dismay over “deeply
flawed” revisions to the project an-
nounced by Westminster last week.
Mayors, council leaders and trans-
port bosses from northern regions ex-
pressed anger at the Integrated Rail
Plan, which included plans to shelve a
new high-speed line from Manchester
to Leeds via Bradford, and a stretch
from Liverpool to Warrington. The
eastern leg of HS2, from the West Mid-
lands to Leeds, was also axed.
Andy Burnham, the Labour mayor of
Greater Manchester, said that the rail
plan was “deeply flawed”. At a Trans-
port for the North meeting in Leeds,
Burnham said that contributions to-
wards the cost of improvements, in-
cluding completing the Northern Pow-
erhouse Rail network, could be gleaned
from rising land values.
“To change the nature of the conver-
sation I would be prepared to consider
local contributions or ways of unlock-
ing [them] to improve what has been
proposed,” he said. “The motion asks
for that process of mediation to see if
there are other solutions, particularly
around financing, that allows that new
line via Bradford back on the table. I
don’t believe we can possibly admit de-
feat on that issue. To do so would be fail-
ing generations in the north of En-
gland. We would be accepting a smaller
economy for the north for the rest of
our lives.”
The Integrated Rail Plan was an-China blocked from
funding nuclear sites
Oliver Wright Policy EditorChina will be cut out of future involve-
ment in developing new nuclear power
stations, Boris Johnson confirmed
yesterday, saying that a potential adver-
sary could have no role in Britain’s
“critical national infrastructure”.
Under a deal signed by Theresa May
in 2016 the Chinese state nuclear firm
CGN agreed to invest £6 billion for a
33.5 per cent stake in the Hinkley Point
C plant in Somerset.
As part of the deal the government at
the time agreed to pursue approval for
CGN’s nuclear reactor technology so it
could be used at a new power station at
Bradwell in Essex that would be owned
and run by the Chinese company.
But amid growing concerns over
Beijing’s involvement and investment
in industries and areas of research from
telecommunications to nanotechnolo-
gy, Johnson said that the government
was walking away from the 2016 deal.
In the Commons he also suggested
that the plan to allow CGN to own and
operate its own plant in Bradwell had
been abandoned.
He pointed to the National Security
and Investment Bill, going through
parliament at present, which will allow
the government to “screen” and potent-
ially block sensitive foreign invest-
ments.
However, he added: “What I don’t
want to do is pitchfork away wantonly
all Chinese investment in this country
or minimise the importance in thiscountry of having a trading relation-
ship with China.”
Ministers have committed to build-
ing at least one new nuclear power sta-
tion by 2024 and have unveiled a fund-
ing mechanism to make nuclear power
more attractive to domestic investors.
They hope it will allow the £20 billion
Sizewell C nuclear plant in Suffolk to go
ahead. CGN has a 20 per cent stake in
the project — due to be built by the
French power firm EDF — but is likely
to pull out in light of the government’s
decision on Bradwell. A government
source said they hoped the Chinese in-
vestment in Sizewell would be replaced
by more “palatable investors from like-
minded countries”.
Matthew Pennycook, Labour’s shad-
ow climate change minister, said John-
son’s comments left “too many unan-
swered questions” about China’s in-
volvement in UK nuclear power. “We
need to know as a matter of urgency
how and when the government intends
to unwind past agreements and remove
China’s state-controlled nuclear energy
company from involvement in any
future UK nuclear project,” he said.
Ministers are concerned that Britain
needs more nuclear projects to meet its
carbon reduction targets. The country’s
seven nuclear plants provide about 17
per cent of its electricity needs but this
will fall by almost half by 2024. Further
plants are due to shut between then and
2030 and, even with the new Hinkley
Point, the proportion of nuclear energy
in the grid will fall.PM’s maskless
Macbeth adds
to his troubles
George Grylls Political ReporterShe won support for her campaign on
with his adviser Liam Booth-SmithBoris Johnson has been accused of
ignoring guidance on masks after he
was seen without a face covering at a
performance of Macbeth.
Witnesses told The Guardian that the
prime minister sat through the play at
the Almeida Theatre in Islington, north
London, on Tuesday without a mask,
despite guidance requesting that audi-
ence members cover their faces when
not eating or drinking. There is no legal
requirement to wear a mask at indoorevents. Johnson allowed the mask to
hang around his chin for the first half
before completely taking it off after the
intermission, according to theatrego-
ers. He was said to have put it back on
at the end of the play. He was also pho-
tographed in the foyer without a mask.
Johnson’s press secretary said: “The
prime minister follows all Covid rules.”
This month Johnson was photo-
graphed speaking to nurses at a hospi-
tal in Northumberland without a face
covering. He also sat next to Sir David
Attenborough, 95, at the Cop26 climate
conference in Glasgow without a mask.The prime minister
was seen with the
mask below his
mouth for the first
half of the playture levy to help to fund the project on
the basis that such properties would in-
crease in value.
Burnham said: “When you commit to
a line, you raise [the] value of some of
the land across that line. If you take
Bradford, land values would increase in
the city centre, and other countries
around the world give powers at a local
level to capture that value to help pay
for the infrastructure.”
The plans were backed by Don Mack-
enzie, a Conservative North Yorkshire
councillor, who earlier criticised La-
bour politicians for making “well-re-
hearsed ever more negative state-
ments” about the Integrated Rail Plan.
Hans Mundry, a councillor in War-
rington, branded the plans a “mess” and
said that construction of high-speednounced by Grant Shapps, the trans-
port secretary, last week, and set out
plans for a £17.2 billion investment in
Northern Powerhouse Rail. The com-
mitment fell far short of the £42.1 billion
that would have been needed for the
plans, put forward by Transport for the
North, in full.
Under the new plans some new high-
speed track will be built, including
between Manchester and Hudders-
field. A line from Warrington to Man-
chester will also be built. The trans-
pennine route from York to Manches-
ter will be electrified by 2030-32.
Burnham highlighted that the
building of Crossrail in the south
included local contributions. In
London property developers must pay
into the mayor’s community infrastruc-News
‘dementia tax on working class’
We’ll pay for rail lines, say northern leaders
Ben Clatworthy
Transport Correspondentrail should have begun in the north.
“None of this delivers what we were
promised, it delivers bits and pieces.
You’ve had the meal in the south and we
can have what’s left on the table.”
Dan Jarvis, the mayor of South York-
shire, said: “We still want to make the
case for the government to do what
they originally committed to do.”
Yesterday Dame Diana Johnson, the
Labour MP for Kingston upon Hull
North, said in the Commons that re-
generation of cities such as Hull and
Bradford “will be held back for another
20 years, with poor connectivity, small
speed and inadequate capacity for pas-
sengers and freight”.
Transport for the North was stripped
of its funding by ministers last week.
Labour described the move as a
“Whitehall power grab” after its furious
reaction to plans to downgrade North-
ern Powerhouse Rail.
Johnson said: “By removing Trans-
port for the North’s responsibility for
developing [Northern Powerhouse
Rail], ministers reduce scrutiny and ac-
countability and show no interest in
working in partnership with the north.
So when challenged, ministers have de-
cided to stop the criticism by gutting the
powers of Transport for the North and
centralising to Whitehall responsibility
for rebranding the transpennine route
upgrade.”
Andrew Stephenson, the rail minis-
ter, said: “Transport for the North is not
a delivery body nor has it ever been.
Their statutory function purely is to de-
velop a strategic transport plan for the
north in the same way that Midlands
Connect does for the Midlands.”Andy Burnham, mayor of Greater Manchester, right, with fellow northern
mayors and transport leaders, demanded that high-speed lines be reinstatedVICTORIA JONES; DANNY LAWSON/PA; STEVE BACKCox resumes
second job as
Commons sits
Henry ZeffmanSir Geoffrey Cox returned to his con-
troversial legal work yesterday while
the Commons was sitting, a week after
Boris Johnson urged MPs to put their
parliamentary duties first.
The former Conservative attorney-
general has faced intense scrutiny over
his practice as a QC in recent weeks, es-
pecially because of his work represent-
ing members of the government of the
British Virgin Islands (BVI).
Yesterday Cox, who has earned
around £1 million from legal work in the
past year, appeared as a lawyer in a re-
mote hearing on the case for two hours
while debates were ongoing in the
Commons chamber.
Angela Rayner, Labour’s deputy
leader, said that the issue was a “test of
leadership” for Johnson, saying: “Geof-
frey Cox is taking the mick and the
prime minister is letting him get away
with it.” Johnson has backed a ban on
MPs working as paid consultants or
lobbyists and said those “prioritising
outside interests” and neglecting their
constituents should face investigation.
Cox has argued that “it is up to the
electors of Torridge and West Devon
whether or not they vote for someone
who is a senior and distinguished pro-
fessional in his field and who still prac-
tices that profession”. He was paid more
than £54,000 for legal work in October,
according to the most recent update to
the register of MPs’ interests.