A congestion charge for Bristol could still be part of transport bosses’ plans, despite a resounding no vote in a referendum in Manchester.

The Government was offering cities around the country £1.4 billion of Transport Innovation Fund (TIF) money to make transport improvements, in return for introducing an urban congestion charge.

Manchester was the first to have its bid considered and it held a referendum of more than two million people to gauge opinion.

But none of the 10 boroughs asked came back in favour for the controversial scheme.

The West of England Partnership (WEP), which includes all four councils in the former Avon area, is also in the process of putting together a TIF bid.

It is considering introducing congestion charging in Bristol to cut down on congestion which it says could cost the city’s economy up to £600 million a year by 2016.

WEP insists that such a charge would only be introduced if the city had improved public transport services in place beforehand.

Now it is waiting to see if the Government continues with its policy of only offering the TIF fund if congestion charging is part of the transport package.

Councillor Mark Bradshaw, Bristol City Council’s executive member for transport, said he realised that Manchester’s no vote showed how difficult it was to introduce such controversial schemes.

He said: “The vote in Manchester highlights the challenges in bringing forward road user charging schemes as part of a package of transport improvements.

“This emphasises the need to engage with all interested parties through the development process, and to ensure that any proposals include a wide range of high quality transport improvements that would come before any local road user charge.

“We wait with interest to see the Government’s reaction.

Motoring groups welcomed the Manchester no vote.

RAC spokesman Adrian Tink said: “Motorists are tired of being taxed for going about their daily lives and clearly those in Manchester see this as an additional motoring tax too far.

“Motorists want to be rewarded for changing behaviour not simply penalised for not doing so.

“This vote will have ramifications up and down the country in cities such as Bristol, Leeds and Cambridge who have been watching this decision closely - this is likely to be the death knell for those schemes, certainly in the short to medium term.”

Association of British Drivers spokesman Nigel Humphries said: “This is a great result.

“The world was watching the people of Manchester and they have seen through the great government transport bribe and voted to reject road pricing.

“Surely this means the Government must now abandon its back door plans to tax, track and inconvenience drivers with road tolls.”