THE CRUISE war between Southampton and Liverpool has been ratcheted up by a Euro transport chief who waded into the battle trashing objections to a turnaround port in the northern city.

Brian Simpson, who chairs the European Parliament’s transport committee, backed a fresh bid by Liverpool to muscle in on Southampton’s cruise business with public funds claiming the argument against the use of EU state aid was “flimsy”.

And the Labour Euro-MP for Liverpool accused the port of Southampton of defending a “near- monopolistic position in the cruise sector”.

Mr Simpson has written to the Department for Transport (DfT), suggesting there are no legal barriers to Liverpool’s plans to start and finish cruises at its £20m Pier Head terminal.

Liverpool City Council has made a second application to the DfT to upgrade the status of the terminal, paid for by a mix of Government and European funding, for turnaround cruises less than a year since then Labour transport minister Paul Clark ruled it out saying it “would be very likely to have an unfair and adverse effect on other cruise ports.”

He added: “It would be unfair to allow one port to benefit from a publicly funded development when competitors have found, or would have to find, private money to achieve the same objective.”

The Liverpool facility was built with public funds on the condition it be used only for calling cruises.

The proposal sparked a major row, with Associated British Ports (ABP), owner of the Port of Southampton, lobbying against Liverpool’s bid, warning of “massive damage” to Hampshire’s cruise business.

It subsequently emerged Liverpool docks bosses had asked Portsmouth for support in return for their backing of its cruise expansion hopes.

ABP has criticised the new bid as a “waste of taxpayers’ time and money” while Southampton’s Labour MPs Alan Whitehead and John Denham, the shadow business secretary, insist nothing has changed but the Government.

The letter from Mr Simpson added: “All over Europe, ports get state aid rules without any objections being raised by the EU.

“I hope the UK Government could overcome the obvious civil service bias towards Southampton and approve a turnaround facility at Liverpool, on the grounds of providing competition.”

Transport minister Mike Penning, who is considering Liverpool’s bid, has accepted an invitation from Liverpool council to visit the city next month.