HS2 is spending at least £40m filling in holes and closing down sites on the former route to Manchester – despite Andy Burnham’s pledge to bring it back, The i Paper can reveal.
Around £1bn had already been spent buying properties and land and carrying out preliminary work on Phase 2 of the project north of Birmingham when it was cancelled by former Tory Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in October 2023.
The Government initially said it would lift the safeguarding of land and start selling homes back, but this was paused due to pressure from political leaders including Burnham who hoped to see the project resurrected.
Shorts
But The i Paper can reveal remediation work has now quietly resumed which will undo much of the work that was carried out between 2021 and 2023.
