Scrapping the HS2 rail line to Manchester could be a “gross act of vandalism”, senior Tories have warned Rishi Sunak.

Former chancellor George Osborne and ex-deputy prime minister Lord Heseltine mentioned the transfer would imply “abandoning” the North and Midlands.

Writing in The Times, they warned the prime minister: “Governments are remembered for what they build and create.

“Make this error and yours might solely be recognized for what it cancelled and curtailed.”

If the northern section was cancelled “the remaining stump, little greater than a shuttle service from Birmingham to a London suburb, would grow to be a global image of our decline”, they mentioned.

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“The authorities ought to study why different European international locations have been capable of construct high-speed rail extra cheaply, and convey the identical evaluate of planning for large vitality infrastructure to move tasks that it’s promising.

“That’s a sensible serious way forward; not the gross act of vandalism that cancelling HS2 would represent.”

It comes amid recommendations Mr Sunak is contemplating whether or not to scrap or delay the leg of HS2 from Birmingham to Manchester in response to hovering prices.

And it’s nonetheless unclear if the ultimate part between Old Oak Common in west London and the deliberate central vacation spot within the capital at Euston will go forward.

Cabinet minister Grant Shapps advised Sky News’ Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips present there may very well be a change to the “sequencing” and “pace” of HS2 from the federal government because of the hovering price ticket.

“Money is not infinite,” mentioned the previous transport secretary, who’s now in command of the Ministry of Defence.

“All of these big decisions where budgets are, particularly in the case of HS2, inexorably going higher and higher and higher, and your viewers are having to pay that bill, it is absolutely right that the government looks at it and says: hold on a minute, is this just a sort of open-ended cheque or are we going to make sure this project gets delivered to a pace and a timetable that actually works for the taxpayer?

“We take these long-term selections severely, however we do not suppose any sum of money, regardless of how huge the finances will get, that you must simply keep on ploughing it in. There must be a degree the place you say, maintain on a minute, let’s simply take a break right here.”

HS2 was first touted by Labour in 2009, but it was the coalition government that signed off the plan, designed to connected the South, Midlands and North of England with state-of-the-art infrastructure.

Despite billions being poured into the undertaking it has been beset by delays and rising prices – with the japanese leg scrapped completely and work between Birmingham and Crewe delayed because of the influence of inflation.

Some estimates have put the full value at over £100bn, whereas the undertaking has been rated “unachievable” by the infrastructure watchdog.

However, plans to scrap the northern leg have been criticised on all sides of the political spectrum.