EVERY member of the Cabinet is being urged to back The Press’s campaign to Get York Moving.

James Alexander, leader of the Labour opposition on City of York Council, has written to Cabinet Ministers, shadow ministers and all Yorkshire MPs, calling on them to back York’s bid for vital transport funding.

Our campaign is backing the council’s fight for £23 million of Government money to fund three new Park&Ride sites and improvements to the outer ring-road.

Coun Alexander said: “These schemes were agreed by the previous government and put on hold by the new Conservative Liberal Democrat Government. We need all parties to work together to help ease York’s congestion for motorists, the environment and for the local economy and that is why I am bringing this important Press campaign to the heart of Westminster.”

His Labour colleague and York Central MP Hugh Bayley said: “I am speaking to colleagues of different political persuasions to sell the benefits of these schemes.”

We launched our campaign in October, after an expected £23 million Government grant was scrapped.

The money was vital to York’s planned road improvements and the council is now fighting to be included in a second round of Government grants next year.

The campaign has won backing from all major political parties locally as well as many businesses across the city.

The shadow Secretary of State for Transport, Maria Eagle, said the Get York Moving campaign was “vital” for the future of the planned projects.

If the money is provided, it will fund new Park&Rides at Clifton Moor next to Wigginton Road, near the A59 at Poppleton and at Askham Bar, where the existing site will be enlarged.

Planning permission for all three schemes has already been secured. Together they would initially boast 1,600 more Park&Ride spaces.