The Yorkshire Post says: Political promises appear to be broken as frequently as Yorkshire's trains

Jim O’Neill is not one of the usual suspects. A former banker, he was recruited by George Osborne to mastermind the Northern Powerhouse before resigning shortly after Theresa May’s aides came to power and started mocking the concept.

Chris Grayling accused of backtracking on promise to transform Yorkshire transport

Now a member of Mr Osborne’s Northern Powerhouse Partnership, Lord O’Neill continues to champion this region and knows better than most when taxpayers are being taken for a ride.

A prima facie example is this week’s disturbing disclosures about the limited policy-making powers that Transport for the North will have its disposal. Even though Mr Grayling wrote in The Yorkshire Post in August that he would put TfN “on a statutory footing” to give “the North greater control and autonomy”, this is not the case – the proposed powers are much inferior to those given to London.

The proposed Parliamentary regulations, seen by this newspaper, devote more attention to partnership boards, and the constitution of scrutiny committees, to oversee its work rather than the task of overhauling the region’s creaking transport infrastructure. In short, the five functions amount to little more than providing “advice” to the Transport Secretary on the area’s needs.

As Lord O’Neill says, TfN needs proper powers and resources. It’s also counter-productive, he warns, when there are “more than 40 unnecessary civil servant posts at DfT (Department for Transport) focusing on Northern transport and second guessing work done by TfN”.

Coming so soon after the row over the scaling back of rail electrification schemes, the central issue is not just about policy delivery. It’s also one of trust. For, while Mr Grayling did have the courtesy to meet his critics last month, patience is, once again, wearing very thin because of the extent to which political promises appear to be broken as frequently as some of the antiquated trains operating on this region’s railways.