Ministers need to re-energise wavering Tories on HS2 as well as Labour

Ministers’ attention is now firmly focused on arguing that to abandon HS2 would be a sign that Labour is ‘playing politics with prosperity’, as Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin is set to say later today, or ‘abandoning the North’. Yesterday the Prime Minister slipped in a joke about Ed Balls being absent from the Commons because he was trying to work out what his party’s policy should be on the new line. Today Julian Smith is batting for CCHQ, predicting that ‘if Labour oppose HS2 they’ll be dismissing the long-term future of the country for a short-term political gamble’. As James explained last night, this is all part of an attempt to ‘smoke out’ the Opposition.

Northern business leaders have underlined that ‘abandoning the north’ threat, with a letter from a group of Northern Chambers of Commerce to the Prime Minister urging the government to stick by its plans for HS2 because of the number of jobs the line will create.