Bolton Metrolink cancellation ‘could be revisited’, says MP

Chancellor Rachel Reeves said the previous government had ‘covered up’ a ‘£22 billion hole’ in spending.

The cuts will affect transport plans in Bolton and surrounding areas – with the axing of Restoring your Railway Fund, which had funded business cases for a tram from Radcliffe to Bolton and a train to Rawtenstall from Bury.

Bolton Conservative leader Cllr Martyn Cox said he thought the chancellor’s statement was ‘political rather than economic’, and that it was ‘wrong’ for the chancellor to commit to a public sector payrise as infrastructure projects were cut.

Cllr Martyn Cox is the leader of the Conservatives on Bolton Council (Image: Henry Lisowski)

He said: “They keep saying they want to get Britain building.

“Well, they just cancelled a lot of building projects in order to pay a public sector pay increase – that is not going to get the economy going, and she’s done it without asking for any increases in productivity.”

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‘They’ve just hit reality: they can’t have everything’

However, Cllr Cox said he did not disagree with all of the chancellor’s decisions – agreeing that it was a ‘tough job’.

He added: “There are a couple of things in there that I think were overdue – pensioners’ winter fuel allowance, well maybe some pensioners don’t really need that. Some do, some don’t.

“Bringing some order to that which she seems to be prepared to do was probably a sensible thing. The statement wasn’t without some merits, but it was very political.”

On the scrapping of the Radcliffe to Bolton tram, Cllr Cox said: “Rachel Reeves yesterday got a reality check. All throughout the last 14 years there hasn’t been an area of public spending where the Labour party hasn’t wanted it increasing.

“They wanted adult social services, they wanted an awful lot of money for that, they’ve been talking about extra money for defence, they talk about extra police officers.

“Well, they’ve just hit reality: they can’t have everything. You have to decide what your priorities are and what are not your priorities.

“You simply cannot keep raising public expenditure every year, year in year out, and expect to grow your economy – the two things are a contradiction.”

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‘It’s become increasingly clear just how much of a bad situation that we’re in’

Newly-elected Bolton North East MP Kirith Entwistle, praised the chancellor’s statement, and insisted the chancellor had not been talking about austerity.

She said: “It was really clear how angry [the chancellor] was about the situation we’re in, the economy we’ve inherited. I think for us over the last few weeks, it’s become increasingly clear just how much of a bad situation that we’re in.

“It was really hard for her to have to make some really tough decisions – and I know constituents have contacted me about the winter fuel allowance that she made.

“But, I think it just sort of comes down to: we have really inherited a massive hole in public finances, we want to stick to our manifesto commitments – we’re fully committed to those – but we also want to grow the economy and get the country moving again.”

Kirith Entwistle is the new MP for Bolton North East (Image: Kirith Entwistle)

Tram decision ‘could be revisited’

When asked about the cancellation of the Restoring Your Railway fund – which means the cancellation of future transport schemes such as a Radcliffe to Bolton tram and Bury to Rawtenstsall train – Ms Entwistle said: “Unfortunately, it’s part of the difficult decisions we’ve had to take coming into Government.

“I don’t see a reason why these sort of measures and plans can’t be revisited once we have started growing the economy again, but I just think there are so many different issues we have to tackle.

“It’s about reducing NHS waiting times, the announcement with junior doctors, it’s public sector pay increases, bringing more teachers into schools, providing money for free breakfast clubs, it’s all these measures we were really keen to introduce to try and help and support people.

“The new deal for workers, getting more people back to work – all of these things cost money, we don’t want to have to try and take them out of people’s personal income, which is why we’ve said we don’t want to raise taxes, but that money has to be found somewhere and I think it’s in our best interests as a nation to try and make sure we are putting money in the right places.”

If you have a story, I cover the whole borough of Bolton. Please get in touch at jack.fifield@newsquest.co.uk.