ONLY half of the £830m that the Government announced would be coming to West Yorkshire as part of last week’s budget was new money - a meeting was told.

As part of the Autumn Budget Rishi Sunak announced that West Yorkshire would be getting the huge allocation of funding for transport schemes.

Part of the £830m would be used to begin work on a West Yorkshire wide mass transit system, and there would also be improvements to bus stations and cycling facilities.

The funding was raised at a meeting of West Yorkshire Combined Authority’s Transport Committee on Friday when Helen Ellerton, policy manager, told members that the Authority had originally made a bid for £920m.

Mass transit in Bradford a step closer after West Yorkshire awarded £830 MILLION

The Authority was now developing its business case for how the money would be spent to submit to the Government.

Chair Susan Hinchcliffe, also Bradford Council Leader, said: “A lot of it was money we’d already been promised. Some of it has been re-packaged as new money.”

Mrs Ellerton said: “Of the £830m about £400m is new money.”

Cllr Hinchcliffe replied: “We are grateful of anything coming out of central Government but we need to be clear that a lot of this isn’t new money.”