benefit

The world’s longest suspension bridge is currently in Turkey but a new record could be held if the government in Italy gets its way and the Messina Bridge project is completed by 2033 as planned

The world’s longest suspension bridge was given the green light last year – and it could be of serious interest to Brits. In 2025, the Italian government’s plans to build the longest suspension bridge in the world was approved. If it becomes a reality, it would connect the mainland region of Calabria to Sicily.

However, a lot has happened since then. The controversial Messina Bridge project, which would cost a staggering £11.7bn, faced a setback last November, meaning it was put on hold again.

If the bridge ever gets built along the Strait of Messina, as Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni still intends, it would be a hugely ambitious infrastructure challenge that has been talked about in Italy for decades.

Pietro Salini, chief executive of Webuild, the engineering group leading the project, said it would be “transformative for the whole country” and he promised that it would “stimulate growth, employment, and lawfulness across southern Italy”.

The colossal bridge, consisting of two towers stretching 400-metres (1,300 feet), would span an incredible 3.3km (2.05 miles). Three lanes of traffic would sit either side of two railway lines in the middle.

It would be particularly welcomed by Brits travelling in Italy, because it would cut their journey to Sicily to just ten minutes, compared to taking the ferry, which can take a lot longer than the 30 minutes crossing when you factor in the immense queuing at peak times.

Speaking last year, Meloni said: “It is not an easy task but we consider it an investment in Italy’s present and future, and we like difficult challenges when they make sense.”

Transport minister Matteo Salvini spoke in August that the goal was to have it built between 2032 and 2033. He also boasted that 120,000 jobs a year would be created, something he said would bring economic growth to the poor regions of Sicilia and Calabria, which is on the tip of Italy’s boot.

Rome was given the approval for the project in August after years of the plans being scrapped. One of the biggest reasons plans have been halted historically was concerns of mafia fraud, including worries about taxpayers’ money being siphoned off by the Sicilian and Calabrian gangsters.

Other concerns have repeatedly been raised about environmental damage, cost and safety, and given the region is one of the most seismically active areas in the Mediterranean, designers promised the Strait of Messina Bridge would be able to withstand earthquakes.

However, in November, yet another setback was reported, after an Italian court ruled the bridge would go against EU environmental and tender rules.

The Court of Auditors ruling concluded: “The assumptions regarding the various ‘reasons of public interest’ are not validated by technical bodies and are not supported by adequate documentation.”

But the Italian government is refusing to give up and has vowed to review the ruling carefully and continue with its ambitions of making the bridge a reality.

As well as still having to convince the Italian Court of Auditors and both national and EU environmental agencies, there would also be pushback from the 4,000 residents who live either side of the Strait.

Their homes would be at risk of demolition and this could mean legal challenges regarding having to abandon their properties.

As it stands, the current world’s longest suspension bridge is the 915 Canakkale Bridge in Turkey – which connects Asia to Europe and takes six minutes to cross.

Construction across the passage of water (Dardanelles Strait) started in 2017 and it only became open to the public three years ago. Journey times have been cut by up to 93%.

This means 90-minute ferry trips can be avoided by using the bridge that starts in Gelibolu, Turkey, which is based on the European side of the country, to the Asian town of Lapseki.

WASHINGTON — Vice President JD Vance on Friday held the inaugural meeting of a new anti-fraud task force he’s leading as the Trump administration seeks to show it’s cracking down on potential misuse of social programs.

Vance, speaking Friday before the task force held a closed-door meeting, said that the federal government for decades had not taken the issue of fraud seriously and that it needed to be tackled with “a whole-government approach.”

“This is not just the theft of the American people’s money,” Vance said. “It is also the theft of critical services that the American people rely on.”

President Trump, a Republican, has made a crackdown on fraud part of his chief domestic focus as voters have said they’re concerned about affordability ahead of November’s midterm elections. That effort comes after allegations of fraud involving day-care centers run by Somali residents in Minneapolis prompted a massive immigration crackdown in the Midwestern city, resulting in widespread protests.

Vance cited some of the Minnesota allegations on Friday. Last month, he held a news conference to announce a temporary halt of some Medicaid funding until the state took actions that federal officials said would address their concerns.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat who faced Vance as a vice presidential candidate in 2024, has called it a “campaign of retribution” and said the Trump administration was “weaponizing the entirety of the federal government to punish blue states like Minnesota.”

The task force is also the most visible assignment to date that Trump has given to Vance, who is seen as a potential 2028 presidential candidate.

Vance and the task force, which includes about half the president’s Cabinet, the leader of a new Justice Department division focused on prosecuting fraud and Federal Trade Commission Chair Andrew Ferguson, are set to meet regularly to look at rooting out potential fraud and waste in federal benefit programs.

Ferguson, who is vice chair of the task force, cast the issue of fraud as a dire crisis facing the country and said it “shreds the social trust on which these programs and our entire nation depend.”

“This fraud crisis is thus existential,” he said. “If we fail to address it, the fabric of our nation will swiftly unravel.”

Joining the task force was Colin McDonald, a top aide to the Justice Department’s second in command. He was recently confirmed as the assistant attorney general overseeing the new division at the department focused on prosecuting fraud.

The Justice Department has long prosecuted fraud nationally through its Criminal Division, but the Trump administration says the new division is needed to crack down on rampant fraud.

Price writes for the Associated Press.