Basil - you ask for infrastructure that is delayed - well, Metrolink was by about a decade, that is only just happening now that we are paying for it locally.
Add to that electrification of the railway around Manchester, only a small proportion is currently being electrified.
Add rail capacity into the south of the region - there is none.
Then we can get to roads - how is the Manchester to Sheffield motorway coming along? 40 years of waiting for funding and still getting no where.
So yes, there are loads of infrastructure investment that we need in the north, investment that has been asked for over many decades that is never ever forthcoming.
You miss the important point that developing business plans for these schemes is hugely expensive, there are no such plans on the board, developed by norther authorities to develop a HS3 to Leeds etc because the cost would effectively be wasted - the chances of getting the money miniscule - just wasting valuable local money.