BRADFORD East MP Imran Hussain has urged Government to look at the Manchester Mayor’s Northern Powerhouse Rail funding plans.

Speaking in Parliament, Mr Hussain called for the Minister for Transport to look closely at the alternative funding plans from Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, to get Northern Powerhouse Rail built from Leeds to Manchester through Bradford.

Under the full Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) plans, a new high-speed, high-capacity rail line would have been built between Manchester and Leeds, with a stop at a new Bradford city centre station. However, these plans were scrapped last November by the Government in their Integrated Rail Plan.

Proposals were set out by Mr Burnham to raise funding using a similar model used to help build London’s £19 billion Crossrail network.

Mr Hussain said: “I am deeply disappointed that rather than pump the same investment that major transport infrastructure projects in London have seen into Bradford and the rest of the north by delivering NPR, Ministers have instead given us a disjointed collection of different schemes, and I am further disappointed that whilst presented with an alternative funding plan by the Manchester Mayor to get NPR built, the Minister brushed aside calls to even look at it in Parliament.”