City rail bid is back on track; PROJECT: Councillors call for north-south link to get go-ahead.

Byline: Les Reid

CITY councillors last night gave unanimous support for the beleaguered northsouth rail scheme through Coventry and Warwickshire, amid hold-ups in government funding.

But Labour opposition councillors called on Conservative council leaders to ensure the latest business case, to be submitted to government in December, finally proves the scheme is financially viable.

The city's politicians have been divided over whether the scheme - including a new Ricoh rail station - should have been "fast-tracked" for government funding this summer.

It followed scathing criticism from Transport Secretary Lord Adonis, who provisionally approved pounds 12 million funding subject to receiving a vastly improved business case.

Frustrated council leaders say they had co-operated with the Department for Transport for five years in submitting robust financial plans.

The council's Conservative deputy leader Kevin Foster called a debate at last night's full council meeting urging cross-party consensus that the NUCKLE rail project, which would also eventually link to Kenilworth and Leamington, was "a key part of regenerating our city".

He said the next few months offered "an ideal chance" for progress, and called for all parties to come together in calling for government approval to be sped up.

The council hopes building could then be completed in two years, rather than up to five years under the more conventional bureaucratic approval process.

Labour group leader coun John Mutton said the Labour group had originally advanced plans for a new Ricoh station, without support from Conservative councillors. He added: "We will give a clear message of support as we've always done, but the council has had five years to put together a plan to convince ministers it's a goer. Now the new business plan won't be put together until December or January. If anybody's wasting time they should look a little closer to home."

The council's city development director John McGuigan believes the earliest hope of "fast-track" approval is now next summer. The project, including new bay platforms at Coventry and Bedworth stations and up to four multiplecarriage trains an hour, is thought crucial to the huge Friargate office development plan around Coventry station, which would 15,000 new jobs.