Latest news with #NorthernPowerhouseRail
Metro
2 days ago
- Metro
Plane carrying 242 people heading to London crashes into fireball
To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video A plane carrying more than 200 people crash-landed near an airport shortly after taking off for the UK. Photos show black smoke and a fire near the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner's crash site near Ahmedabad's airport, the largest city in Gujarat, western India. The Air India flight had just taken off for Birmingham before it crashed. It's unclear what caused the accident. No casualties have been reported so far, but photos on social media have shown passengers being wheeled away on stretchers. Initial photos seem to show the plane having landed on a building of some sort. Sort: Newest first Oldest first Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@ For more stories like this, check our news page. MORE: London commuters furious after being overcharged for tickets due to 'technical glitch' MORE: Northern Powerhouse Rail set for comeback after Rachel Reeves announces £3,500,000,000 upgrade MORE: Man, 28, dies after crash that closed A14 for hours
ITV News
2 days ago
- Business
- ITV News
Treasury technicalities plus party politics bring more attention for the North East
The Chancellor's big ticket items for the North East came early - which is somewhere between encouraging and disconcerting when we're talking about public transport projects. Around £2.8 billion from the Spending Review was announced last Wednesday for infrastructure in our region, including extending the Tyne and Wear Metro to Washington. By comparison, Rachel Reeves' big speech today was a bit of an anticlimax. In the small print afterwards, we found that areas of Newcastle, Middlesbrough and Stockton that 'have been too easily left behind' are to receive up to £20m over the next decade for things like improving parks and tackling graffiti. The government are calling them 'trailblazer neighbourhoods', which sounds a bit like a spoof initiative from The Thick Of It, and a lot like the Conservative governments' various funding pots for local regeneration schemes. The Tories talked a lot about what they called 'levelling up', with mixed results. Labour have talked less about tackling regional inequalities, but have made a technical tweak that might make a big difference. They've revised the Treasury's 'Green Book', used to judge value-for-money for investment. London and the South East normally deliver bigger bang for your buck, so have often been prioritised for new infrastructure. The government says: no more, wider impacts will be considered, so regions like ours will be able to compete. Despite some government departments having their budgets squeezed when it comes to day-to-day spending, there is money around for investment due to another tweak to government rules, around borrowing. Rachel Reeves made a passing promise today to set out the government's plans for 'Northern Powerhouse Rail' in the coming weeks. Campaigners say it should mean a high speed rail line from Liverpool to Hull, and up to the North East. It's hard not to be sceptical, given it's been talked about in many forms over many years. The Chancellor spoke quite a bit today about the government being focused on ensuring there's economic growth, and people have opportunity, in every part of the country. She also dedicated a fair amount of time to attacking Reform UK, reflecting the threat they pose to Labour, after their local election successes in places like County Durham. The Chancellor has been accused of doom and gloom in her first 11 months in office, focusing on what she claims has been a horrible inheritance from the Conservatives. With this Spending Review she tried to change gear and set out a more positive plan for the years ahead. The North East will hope to play a big part.
Glasgow Times
3 days ago
- Business
- Glasgow Times
Reeves sets out spending review as Labour government ‘moves to new phase'
The Chancellor said total departmental budgets would grow by 2.3% a year in real terms and promised a 'record cash investment' in the NHS, amounting to an extra £29 billion a year. Setting out the spending review in the House of Commons, Ms Reeves said the tax hikes and looser borrowing rules allowed her to spend £190 billion more on the day-to-day running of public services and £113 billion on investment. Chancellor Rachel Reeves updated MPs on the results of the spending review (House of Commons/UK Parliament/PA) The review marks a watershed moment for the Government, almost a year after Labour's election landslide. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer told the Cabinet that the spending review 'marks the end of the first phase of this Government, as we move to a new phase that delivers on the promise of change for working people all around the country and invests in Britain's renewal'. In a sign of the difficulties which face Sir Keir and the Chancellor, migrants continued to cross the English Channel in small boats on Wednesday. Ms Reeves promised funding of up to £280 million more per year by the end of the spending review period in 2028/29 for the new Border Security Command and committed to end spending on hotels for asylum seekers by the next election. A group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, from a Border Force vessel on Wednesday (Gareth Fuller/PA) In an attack on the Conservative legacy, she said: 'The party opposite left behind a broken system: billions of pounds of taxpayers' money spent on housing asylum seekers in hotels, leaving people in limbo and shunting the cost of failure onto local communities. 'We won't let that stand.' She said 'we will be ending the costly use of hotels to house asylum seekers, in this Parliament' with funding to cut the asylum backlog, hear more appeal cases and return those with no right to be in the UK. The plan would save taxpayers' £1 billion a year, Ms Reeves said. The Chancellor said her 'driving purpose' was 'to make working people, in all parts of our country, better off' as she promised cash to rebuild schools and hospitals, confirmed funding for nuclear power schemes and major transport projects across the country. She said the Government would set out plans for 'Northern Powerhouse Rail' in the coming weeks and an additional £3.5 billion to upgrade the TransPennine route. 'We are renewing Britain,' she said. 'But I know that too many people in too many parts of our country are yet to feel it.' As well as changing Treasury rules to support investment in England's regions, Ms Reeves said the spending review period would provide £52 billion for Scotland, £20 billion for Northern Ireland and £23 billion for Wales. She said research and development funding would rise to more than £22 billion a year and promised £2 billion for the artificial intelligence action plan 'because home-grown AI has the potential to solve diverse and daunting challenges as well as the opportunity for good jobs and investment in Britain'. The Chancellor promised a cash increase of £4.5 billion a year for the core schools budget by the end of the spending review period, but also pledged up to £2.3 billion a year to repair 'crumbling classrooms' and £2.4 billion for a programme to rebuild schools. Police 'spending power' – implying extra cash raised from council tax – will rise by 2.3% a year in real terms over the review period, providing more than £2 billion for forces. Sharon Graham, general secretary of Unite, said: 'Workers and communities need to see action now, promises of jobs can't always be promised for tomorrow and never actually be delivered. 'This must include a comprehensive and tangible jobs agenda that deals with the wave of job losses on the horizon, for example in the oil and gas industry. 'We need a joined up industrial strategy that sees investment in Grangemouth and much-needed procurement decisions on buying British in defence. 'Growth and profits need to convert to jobs and wages. 'Today was a missed opportunity to lay out the funding to tackle key issues, including the energy costs crippling British industry and the local authority debt which is straight-jacketing services in our communities. 'Spending cuts will be seen as austerity, those are the facts. Labour needs to pick up the pace on change otherwise it will be stuck in the political slow lane while other voices get louder.'
Rhyl Journal
3 days ago
- Business
- Rhyl Journal
Government to ‘take forward our ambitions' for Northern Powerhouse Rail
Rachel Reeves said plans will be published shortly. NPR is a scheme to improve rail services between Liverpool and Leeds, which often suffer delays and cancellations. The previous Conservative government's Integrated Rail Plan sparked outrage among northern leaders in November 2021, when it said that a new line would only be built on one section, and the rest of the route would get enhancements to existing lines. Ms Reeves said: 'In the coming weeks I will set out this Government's plan to take forward our ambitions for Northern Powerhouse Rail.' The Chancellor announced £3.5 billion more funding to support the TransPennine Route Upgrade, a project to improve the railway between York and Manchester. She said the Government would provide £2.5 billion of additional funding to enable the 'continued delivery' of East West Rail, a new line between Oxford and Cambridge. In her spending review she also said railways in Wales would get £445 million investment over 10 years. Improvements at Cardiff West Junction and Padeswood sidings will be among those to be funded. Ms Reeves told the Commons: 'For 14 years, the Conservatives failed the people of Wales. 'Those days are over.'
South Wales Guardian
3 days ago
- Business
- South Wales Guardian
Government to ‘take forward our ambitions' for Northern Powerhouse Rail
Rachel Reeves said plans will be published shortly. NPR is a scheme to improve rail services between Liverpool and Leeds, which often suffer delays and cancellations. The previous Conservative government's Integrated Rail Plan sparked outrage among northern leaders in November 2021, when it said that a new line would only be built on one section, and the rest of the route would get enhancements to existing lines. Ms Reeves said: 'In the coming weeks I will set out this Government's plan to take forward our ambitions for Northern Powerhouse Rail.' The Chancellor announced £3.5 billion more funding to support the TransPennine Route Upgrade, a project to improve the railway between York and Manchester. She said the Government would provide £2.5 billion of additional funding to enable the 'continued delivery' of East West Rail, a new line between Oxford and Cambridge. In her spending review she also said railways in Wales would get £445 million investment over 10 years. Improvements at Cardiff West Junction and Padeswood sidings will be among those to be funded. Ms Reeves told the Commons: 'For 14 years, the Conservatives failed the people of Wales. 'Those days are over.'
