'We will not be the forgotten county over rail'

Staffordshire will not be the forgotten county its council leader said, as plans for a new rail link between Birmingham and Manchester get drawn up.

Martin Murray said his council had not been consulted after plans for the line to replace the cancelled leg of the HS2 project were announced.

The line would cut through "swathes" of Staffordshire but there had been no engagement with officials or residents on the plans, he added.

The council has written to the government, with calls to be included in future discussions. The government said the scheme would not be a revival of HS2 and no decisions had been taken on the specification for the project.

Plans to build the northen leg of the HS2 line, which would have run through Staffordshire, were scrapped in 2023. The line between London and Birmingham is still being constructed.

Land already purchased between the West Midlands and Crewe for the HS2 scheme would be retained.

"This [new] announcement was made without prior engagement with the council," Murray, the acting council leader for Reform UK, said.

"It follows a concerning pattern in which decisions have been announced with little or no direct dialogue with the county council, despite our efforts over the past two years to establish effective, meaningful and constructive engagement on this matter."

He added: "Just because the county is not represented by an elected mayor and combined authority does not mean it can be ignored. We will not be the forgotten county."

Murray has also raised the issue with the mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham and the mayor of the West Midlands Richard Parker.

Staffordshire MPs have also raised the matter with transport secretary Heidi Alexander.

The plans would do nothing to solve the uncertainty faced by their constituents following the scrapping of HS2's northern leg, they said.

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