COUNCIL leaders across Wiltshire, Somerset, Dorset and Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) have united to heavily criticise plans to revoke planning consent for the Stonehenge tunnel.

The government announced plans last month to scrap planning permission for the A303 Amesbury to Berwick Down scheme which would have seen eight miles of dual carriageway created alongside a tunnel near one of Wiltshire’s most prominent landmarks.

Plans were initially put on ice in July 2024 as the newly elected Labour government at the time said it agreed “not to move forward with projects that the previous government refused to publicly cancel despite knowing full well they were unaffordable”.

This comes despite more than £160 million already being spent on the project.

The development consent order (DCO) for the scheme still remains in place – but the government has now published plans to revoke the order.

This would mean that if the project was ever revived the entire approval process, which has taken years to achieve, would have to restart from the beginning.

In a joint statement, the leaders of Dorset, Somerset, Wiltshire and BCP Councils, councillor Nick Ireland, cllr Bill Revans, cllr Ian Thorn and cllr Millie Earl, said: “Revoking the DCO for the A303 Stonehenge Tunnel is a damaging and short-sighted decision that disregards years of planning, consultation and investment.

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“This is a major step backwards for the Wessex area and beyond.

“Wessex and the wider region needs infrastructure investment to unlock our strategic growth ambitions in key sectors that are nationally important, improve connectivity and support communities.

The scheme aimed to cut traffic on the A303 at Stonehenge. Picture: National Highways

“The A303 is a vital strategic corridor and this scheme represented a once-in-a-generation opportunity to address congestion, improve safety, protect heritage and deliver environmental benefits as part of our wider connectivity requirements to unlock our potential.

“This proposal reinforces the imbalance in Government investment that we see here in Wessex and undermines confidence in long-term planning. We urge the Government to reconsider and work with us on a solution that delivers for our region that will deliver growth.”

And the council leaders aren’t the only ones critical of the move.

MP Simon Hoare (North Dorset/Conservatives) described the plans as “a blow to the south west” and has written to the Secretary of State for Transport, Heidi Alexander (Swindon South/Labour) to let his feelings be known about the plans.

He said: ““A future government may wish to resurrect this project and it would be heart-breaking if the process to secure consent had to be begun from the very beginning. Time consumes. Costly.

“Therefore, and while still urging you to rethink your decision and actually deliver the A303 improvements, can a way not be found to legally mothball the DCO?

“There must be a way to do so which would future-proof the project while not writing off a considerable amount of public money spent in getting the proposal to its current state. I would be happy to meet to discuss.”

New Blackmore Vale reader Don Bourne said: “The A303 improvements have been identified for years as the only part of the A303 improvements that have been ignored by Governments of all colours over decades, and in the process have wasted hundreds of millions of tax payers money providing nothing!

“Do not let the current government funding effort to provide better roads for that part of the A303 be wasted, put the approved plans and funding ‘on ice’ as is.

“All of the local and Government MP’s et al should then come together and ‘as one’ body fight for the improvements to be restarted and completed within this Parliament.”

People are being urged to have their say over the proposed order, which can be found here, until the deadline of November 21.

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