BORIS Johnson’s plans for a new royal yacht have descended into farce with no-one in government knowing where the money will come from and one official branding it all an “utter s***show”.
Though plans say there is £200 million to be spent on the yacht, which will supposedly pay for itself by helping the UK Government to secure trade deals, no-one in Whitehall wants to foot the bill for the project.
A Royal Navy blog, reported on by The National in early June, said that their initial concerns about the expense of building and staffing the ship had evaporated as it would be funded “completely separately” to the navy budget.
READ MORE: Navy blog unveils details of Boris Johnson's bonkers 'Royal Yacht' project
On the topic of who would foot the bill, it said: “The £200m budget for the project has been approved by Cabinet but it has not been decided whether this will be by direct grant from the Treasury or shared across Whitehall.
“The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, The Department for International Trade, The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, and the MoD [Ministry of Defence] all share interests in the project.”
Reports in The Sunday Times today say that none of these departments have any idea of where the funding will come from.
Although the MoD has been handed the project, it is looking to cover a £16 billion funding “black hole” in its own annual budget.
What’s more, the MoD were reportedly not even told of the plans to build a new royal yacht, having to find out through the media.
"There is a huge row going on about the royal yacht and who is going to fund it," one senior Tory close to several cabinet ministers told the Sunday Times.
"The seeds are being sown for an almighty set-to between Boris and Rishi over spending,” they added.
Another official told that paper: "The royal yacht is a complete and utter shitshow. When it was first floated, the PM wanted it to be built in Britain.
“It was given to [Cabinet Office minister Michael] Gove to sort out, but it became clear that under procurement rules it could only be built here if it was a navy thing with a bunch of fake weapons on board. So Gove passed it on to the MoD. The Treasury stayed out of it."
A Cabinet source quipped that Boris Johnson could “get someone to set up a trust to pay for it”, a reference to the Prime Minister’s intended method of paying for the renovation of his Downing Street flat.
READ MORE: Scotland's political leaders slam Boris Johnson's £200m plan for new royal yacht
Ahead of the Holyrood elections in May, all of the Scottish party leaders condemned the plans for the yacht, with even Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross distancing himself from them.
While other leaders variously panned the idea as an “absurdity”, “ludicrous”, and a “gimmick”, Ross said he understood the plan to be “about private investment and seeking private support to build this”.
Asked if it should come from public money, he said: “Absolutely not.”
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