Scotched, PM’s ‘stupid’ plan for Irish Sea tunnel

BORIS Johnson’s plan to build ‘the world’s most stupid tunnel’ linking Northern Ireland to Scotland has fallen foul of a Treasury crackdown.

Officials said the ambitious £15billion project was ‘dead, at least for now’ as Rishi Sunak reins in public spending before next month’s Budget, the Financial Times reported.

The Prime Minister first mooted linking Larne and Portpatrick with a tunnel or bridge when he was foreign secretary.

The Government appeared serious about the 25-mile link – commissioning a ‘union connectivity’ review with a remit including assessment of its feasibility. Amid Brexit chaos, Mr Johnson said in 2018: ‘What we need to do is build a bridge between our islands. Why don’t we? Why don’t we?’

But his former top adviser Dominic Cummings said in July: ‘The Prime Minister’s only agenda is buy more trains, buy more buses, have more bikes and build the world’s most stupid tunnel to Ireland – that’s it.’ Yesterday, he said Mr Johnson will ‘insist feasibility studies etc continue so he can at least pretend it will happen’.