Labour revives Northern Powerhouse Rail project with pledge of £45bn funds
Long-awaited plans for better railways across the north of England have been given government backing with an undertaking to “reverse years of chronic underinvestment” by spending up to £45bn building Northern Powerhouse Rail.Just over £1bn has been allocated to work up a detailed three-stage plan to connect cities from Liverpool to Newcastle, which could fulfil most of the demands of northern leaders, in a series of long-term projects.However, mayors may have to raise local funding to pay for parts of the scheme, with the Treasury imposing a £45bn cap as it seeks to avoid the huge overspend that has blighted the construction of HS2.The government also “set out its intention” to build a Birmingham-Manchester line after the completion of Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR), although it insisted this was “not a reinstatement of HS2”.It said NPR would form the backbone of a wider growth plan, with faster, more frequent train services transforming connections between cities.
Northern mayors broadly welcomed the three-stage plan, starting with the current works upgrading TransPennine links, which will be extended to a new Bradford station.A new line connecting Liverpool and Manchester will be in the second stage of works – on a route via Manchester airport and Warrington that follows part of the axed HS2 high-speed rail plan, allowing a possible future link to Birmingham.The third stage will bring further improved connections across the Pennines between Manchester, Leeds, Bradford, Sheffield and York.Work is expected to start in the 2030s but not be completed until at least 2045, with construction of any further new line between Manchester and Birmingham starting only after that.Mayors and local authorities, however, may need to raise revenue to ensure the NPR scheme goes ahead, as London did with Crossrail, should it breach the £45bn envelope.
Keir Starmer said the investment was “proof we’re putting our money where our mouth is, working with local leaders to deliver the transport links that will help working people do what they need to in life”.The prime minister said people in the region had “been let down by broken promises”, adding: “This cycle has to end.No more paying lip service to the potential of the north, but backing it to the hilt.”Government officials said that plans for how local contributions would be funded were being developed but could include business rates, tourist taxes or borrowing against future revenues.Doubt remains over a key demand of Andy Burnham, the Greater Manchester mayor, for an underground station at Manchester Piccadilly.
Burnham has argued it is essential to allow through trains and improve capacity and to build a new line without years of disruption and demolition in the city centre.The cost difference between an underground and overground Piccadilly is thought to run into several billion pounds.Burnham’s support for the plans had been in doubt, and he hinted at his frustration with the process earlier on Tuesday.Speaking at an Institute for Government event, the Labour mayor complained of having to “fight endlessly” in an “attritional battle” with Whitehall departments, accusing them of resisting devolution.However, he welcomed the news as “a significant step forward”, describing it as a “an ambitious vision for the north, firm commitment to Northern Powerhouse Rail and an openness to an underground station in Manchester city centre”.
He said Manchester would “work at pace” to prove the case for an underground station, as well as detailed designs for the line to Liverpool.Steve Rotheram, mayor of the Liverpool city region, welcomed what he called “a genuinely strategic approach … not another empty slogan or back of a fag packet plan but real investment, delivered in a proper partnership with local leaders”.Manchester airport, the UK’s biggest outside London, will have a new station on the line.Ken O’Toole, the airport’s managing director, said it was a “long overdue step towards the creation of a highly productive and internationally competitive northern growth corridor”.Yorkshire may be the biggest immediate beneficiary from the announcements, with Bradford confirmed to get a new station as part of the first stage of upgrades across the Pennines.
In a joint statement, the three Yorkshire mayors, Oliver Coppard, Tracy Brabin and David Skaith, said there was now “a clear national focus on connecting Sheffield, Leeds, Bradford and York with a frequent, electrified service”.Development work will also be taken forward on reopening the Leamside Line, a 21-mile route in County Durham, which was closed in 1964.Henri Murison, chief executive of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership, said the package would “enable a single labour market more like that of London and the south-east … The potential of the north will be unlocked, giving us better-paid jobs and new homes.”However, it is understood that talks between Whitehall and some mayors went right to the wire, with Burnham said to have been reluctant to endorse the proposals as recently as Friday.Another mayoral source said months of negotiations between Whitehall and northern leaders had led to a point where most mayors were happy: “The starting point for this was all wrong.
We were concerned that it had to be a significantly new network and what some of the officials – not the politicians – have been advised was just the cheapest.We’ve ended up with something that’s workable.”
Jacinda Ardern pulls out of Adelaide writers’ week as fallout over Randa Abdel-Fattah’s axing continues
Former New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern has become the latest international headline act to pull out of the 2026 Adelaide writers’ week in protest over the Adelaide festival board’s decision to rescind its invitation to Palestinian-Australian academic Randa Abdel-Fattah.Ardern had been scheduled to discuss her memoir A Different Kind of Power with the ABC’s host of 7.30, Sarah Ferguson, on 3 March.Ardern joins a growing list of international writers and commentators who have decided to boycott the event, along with more than 180 participants. Bestselling author Zadie Smith, Pulitzer prize-winning writer Percival Everett, Greek economist and politician Yanis Varoufakis, Irish novelist Roisín O’Donnell and Russian American journalist M Gessen have all confirmed their withdrawal in recent days
‘It was inspired by a snog in a photo-booth’: how Thompson Twins made Hold Me Now
Thompson Twins were a seven-piece, rag-bag, guitar-based band living in a squat when I met Alannah Currie, who was also squatting in London. She was in an anarchic improv band, the Unfuckables, who were clearly not destined for Top of the Pops, but there was something very exciting about her. When I invited her to come on at the end of a Thompson Twins gig, she stole the show.We slimmed down to a three-piece with Alannah, Joe Leeway [keyboards, percussion, vocals] and myself. Suddenly we were a recognisable trio who could all fit in one car
Post your questions for R&B star Jill Scott
In the age of GLP-1s and the deep-plane facelift making dozens of famous women appear perpetually 32 years old, there’s something extra heartening about Pressha, the lead single from three-time Grammy-winner Jill Scott’s sixth album. “I wasn’t the aesthetic / I guess, I guess, I get it / So much pressure to appear just like them / Pretty and cosmetic,” she sings in a coolly unimpressed kiss-off to a former paramour too cowardly to be seen with her in public.It’s typical of the 53-year-old neo-soul superstar’s direct way with singing about femininity – a quality that’s made her an in-demand collaborator with artists including Dr Dre, Pusha T, Will Smith, Common and Kehlani. As well as having several US No 1 albums to her name, Scott is an artist’s artist: her new record features Tierra Whack, JID and Too $hort; she was originally discovered by Questlove back in her spoken-word days before releasing her platinum-certified debut Who Is Jill Scott? Words and Sounds Vol 1 in 2000.As well as music, Scott has maintained a vivid acting career, starring as James Brown’s wife, Deirdre or “Dee Dee”, in the 2014 biopic Get on Up and taking roles in HBO’s adaptation of Alastair McCall Smith’s The No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency and BET+’s TV adaptation of The First Wives’ Club
Mindy Meng Wang on the ‘disorienting’ experience of her father’s funeral – and the Chinese cyber-opera it inspired
The guzheng virtuoso remembers being shocked by the traditional ceremony in China’s north-west. Now she’s processing it on stageGet our weekend culture and lifestyle emailWhen Mindy Meng Wang’s father died in 2015, the Melbourne-based musician found herself navigating grief while also organising his funeral in her home city in north-western China. It was to be an elaborate, three-day ceremony filled with prescribed rites, including burning paper effigies, ritualised crying and prayer chants.Looking back, Wang describes the experience as “completely shocking and disorienting”. “There were so many rules for what I had to do over those three days, and so many things that I could not understand,” she says
Hawaii: A Kingdom Crossing Oceans review – a feather-filled thriller full of gods, gourds and ghosts
British Museum, LondonThis retelling of Captain Cook’s death and the merging of two cultures is a trove of miraculously preserved wonders – but beware of the shark-toothed club!Relations between Britain and the Pacific kingdom of Hawaii didn’t get off to a great start. On 14 February 1779 the global explorer James Cook was clubbed and stabbed to death at Hawaii’s Kealakekua Bay in a dispute over a boat: it was a tragedy of cultural misunderstanding that still has anthropologists arguing over its meaning. Cook had previously visited Hawaii and apparently been identified as the god Lono, but didn’t know this. Marshall Sahlins argued that Cook was killed because by coming twice he transgressed the Lono myth, while another anthropologist, Gananath Obeyesekere, attacked him for imposing colonialist assumptions of “native” irrationality on the Hawaiians.It’s a fascinating, contentious debate
Three board members and board chair resign from Adelaide festival as Randa Abdel-Fattah sends legal notice
The Adelaide festival is facing an unprecedented leadership crisis after three board members resigned this weekend.The journalist Daniela Ritorto, the Adelaide businesswoman Donny Walford and the lawyer Nick Linke stepped down at an extraordinary board meeting on Saturday following the board’s controversial decision to dump the Palestinian Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah from the 2026 writers’ week program.Separately on Sunday evening, festival board chair Tracey Whiting confirmed that she had decided to resign, “effective immediately”.She did not detail her reasons for resigning, saying only in a statement: “Recent decisions were bound by certain undertakings and my resignation enables the Adelaide Festival, as an organisation, to refresh its leadership and its approach to these circumstances.”“My tenure as Chair has been immensely enjoyable, as has working with the terrific AF team
West African sunshine dishes: Toyo Odetunde’s chicken yassa pot pie and stuffed plantain boats – recipes
How to make penne all’arrabbiata – recipe | Felicity Cloake's Masterclass
Martino’s, London SW1: ‘Beautiful bedlam’ – restaurant review | Grace Dent on restaurants
Helen Goh’s recipe for baked apples with lemon and tahini | The sweet spot
Health by stealth: the rise of drinkable no- and low-alcohol beer
Mark Hix’s recipe for roast pumpkin and pickled walnut salad