GREATER Manchester mayor Andy Burnham told rail bosses today he was “not prepared any longer” to put up with private railway failures in the north of England.

At a regional meeting in Leeds, Mr Burnham told the Rail North Committee (RNC) that he wants to set a public deadline for TransPennine Express (TPE) to improve services.

“The people of our region are not prepared to put up with the misery inflicted on their lives,” he said.

“The committee has addressed the idea of setting them a public deadline.

“For [TPE], it’s kind of last-chance saloon.”

A number of bosses from TPE, Arriva Rail North and Northern were present, and apologised for the severe service cancellations that hampered operations throughout 2018 and led to Northern losing its ownership of the franchise.

Speaking in the Commons, Labour MP Yvonne Fovargue demanded that PM Boris Johnson commit to giving Northern to local authorities so that the “appalling catalogue of delays, overcrowding, cancellations and disruptions” would stop.

In response, Mr Johnson said: “We are developing contingency plans for a replacement for Northern Rail [and] are looking at the whole way the franchise system operates.”

RMT general secretary Mick Cash said: “The time for threats and final warnings is long gone.

“RMT will not take any of this posturing seriously until a timetable is set for Northern and TPE to be stripped of their franchises and the public sector drafted in with the task of rebuilding a rail service out of the rubble these ‎money-raking clowns have left in their wake.”