Here is an idea. A major capital investment programme that will deliver billions of pounds of benefits, boost the engineering and construction industries, increase commerce and tourism – and help to champion a low-carbon future.

It is time to get serious about high-speed rail.

The truth is that we should already have high-speed rail in Britain. We continue to be a seriously backward nation when it comes to public transport, and put to shame by our near neighbours.

Anyone travelling on the TGV can only wonder why a country the size of France can be travelled in comfort and speed without going near an airport when we can't.

The island of Britain is ideal for north-south high-speed rail links. Instead, we see business travellers flying distances that could – and should – be covered by modern
trains.

Of course, nearly 12 years after John Prescott told us that he would be a failure as Transport Secretary if more people didn't get out of their cars and on to public transport, we finally have had the Government announce plans for a high-speed link between Heathrow and Birmingham, with the intention that it will be extended northwards at a later stage.

This is spectacularly too little, too late.

The fact is, if high-speed rail is to deliver the kind of benefits in this country that it can bring, it is north-south that we need to be looking. A vague intention to go further north at some distant point in the future is simply not good enough.

We need a vision of a high-speed rail future for this country, and we need it now.

It is time to say loud and clearly that this vision has to include a direct high-speed rail link to Yorkshire. This is something that, so far, is not seriously on the table.

And unless Yorkshire travellers and business people start shouting for the venture, it will stay off the agenda and the cost to the region of missing out would be huge and irreversible.

High-speed rail delivers a benefit to cost ratio of around 2:1 and the potential benefits to Yorkshire will total billions of pounds.

That equates to the combined economies of Leeds and Sheffield, the two economic "drivers" of the region, which in itself surely justifies a direct link to London.

But the cost of missing out would also be huge. A high-speed line on the other side of the country, without one to Yorkshire, would take away huge amounts of investment as people and companies relocated close to the new express route. We cannot let this happen.

We have long had a sense of not getting a fair deal for transport spending in Yorkshire. Figures for 2007-8 show that transport spending was a lowly £234 per head in Yorkshire compared with a UK average of £326 and a whopping £641 in London.

Furthermore, vast amounts of taxpayers' money continue to be ploughed into the West Coast main line. In 2007-8, Virgin received a subsidy of £162m, or 3.8p per passenger kilometre. By contrast, National Express East Coast paid £32m in net terms as part of its franchise agreement, in effect a negative subsidy, equivalent to 2.4p per passenger kilometre.

No one is saying that people and businesses in the North-West don't deserve good transport links, but so do people in this region.

The simple fact is that we are not getting a fair deal in Yorkshire and that must not be extended to high-speed rail.

At the moment, the only serious proposal for Yorkshire is a link between London and Manchester, with a trans-Pennine branch across to Leeds. This is frankly a nonsense because the whole point of high-speed rail is direct links and much shorter journey times.

This proposal would end any chance of a genuine high-speed link from Yorkshire to London. But it is a plan which should also be rejected because it would mean that we cannot get to where we surely want to be in the long term, with a West Coast high-speed link to Glasgow via Manchester and an East Coast link to Edinburgh via Sheffield, Leeds and Newcastle.

We can – and should – have a "Y shape" with two branches, one to Manchester and one to Leeds via Sheffield, the latter perhaps also including Nottingham to increase still the economic rationale for the line.

It is for those representing Yorkshire to do all we can to ensure that becomes part of the vision. So we must campaign on this as a county and I am delighted that the Yorkshire Post has launched the Fast Track to Yorkshire campaign.

If we all campaign together, political and business leaders, MPs and councils, we can surely ensure that Yorkshire does not miss out this time. If we succeed, we will have a direct link from Yorkshire to London, with all the benefits that will bring. We must not settle for anything less.


Greg Mulholland is the Liberal Democrat MP for Leeds North West.