Andrew Jones, the MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough and Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Transport Secretary, Justine Greening MP, joined the national centre stage at the announcement that more than 900 jobs will be created and thousands more secured after Ms Greening approved a £4.5bn contract to supply Britain with the next generation of intercity trains.
In a major boost to the UK’s manufacturing industry, 596 railway carriages will be built at a brand new train factory in the north east of England including new trains for the East Coast line.
Agility Trains, a consortium made up of Hitachi and John Laing, has been awarded the contract to build and maintain the trains under the Intercity Express Programme, the project to replace Britain’s Intercity 125 trains with new higher capacity modern trains.
Andrew, who works closely alongside Ms Greening, said:
A new train factory is fantastic news for the North East and will be welcomed by everyone who wants to see a thriving UK manufacturing sector.
It means 730 new skilled jobs created at the factory, 200 jobs in constructing the plant and thousands of jobs secured in the supply chain.
There will be 92 complete trains made in the factory which will be used on the East Coast and Great Western Main Lines. The new trains will be faster, and so allow more frequent services, plus each carriage is longer and so tackles overcrowding.
