If you’re after a lesson in how to lose friends and alienate people, look no further than the government’s cack-handed approach to improving transport in the Red Wall.

Last week Grant Shapps announced insouciantly to any northerner who was listening that there was not ‘much point’ (his words) in an important part of the Northern Powerhouse rail project, namely a section of brand-new track covering much of the route between Manchester and Leeds.