Rishi Sunak confirms HS2’s Manchester leg will be scrapped
Rishi Sunak has declined to repeat Suella Braverman’s claim that a “hurricane” of mass migration is coming to the UK while dodging questions on whether she was right to vilify people seeking to migrate as part of an “invasion”.
The Home Secretary’s comments in her Tory conference speech caused unease among some senior Conservatives.
When it was put to the Prime Minister that he was happy with the Home Secretary’s remarks, he BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Thursday: “Your words, not mine.”
It comes as Conservative former prime minister David Cameron attacked Mr Sunak’s decision to scrap the northern leg of HS2 to Manchester, condemning it as having “thrown away 15 years of cross-party consensus” and making future infrastructure projects much harder.
Mr Sunak used his Conservative Party conference speech to promise to put the £36 billion of savings into a raft of other transport schemes.
He also unveiled radical plans to stamp out cigarette smoking for future generations, announcing plans for a UK smoking ban by raising the legal smoking age by one year every year.
However, it is understood another of Mr Sunak’s predecessors, Liz Truss, will vote against the plan, raising the prospect of other right-wingers trying to join her in blocking it.
The Independent first revealed secret talks to scrap the link beyond Birmingham.
