I’M no Victor Meldrew, but I confess that I erupted with his classic outburst of disbelief to discover the notion of constructing a bridge from Jersey to France is to be given serious consideration. Since it was first mooted in April – I know it was April because of all the ‘April Fool’ responses it attracted – we’ve had credit crunch, economic downturn, local budget restraints and ordinary folk unable to raise the finance for essential dwelling.

Yet none of this appears to have registered with those keen to promote more cash-devouring mega-structures quite out of scale and relevance.  We’ve already been saddled with the prospect of a huge incinerator, slap alongside the most densely populated area of the Island, with the potential to cause embarrassment to its future operators, health authorities and political apologists.

We’re about to construct a Waterfront of office blocks for the finance industry just at a time when banks are reeling, institutions contracting, and there are serious concerns that businesses could be looking to relocate to cheaper and less regulated pastures new. Despite this, there’s now the prospect of expensive feasibility studies on a project likely to generate more concrete production than would be needed to shore-up the sea defences of the entire Channel Islands.

Billed as a ‘Bridge TO France’, you really have to consider the idea from both sides. Does it also stack up as a link FROM the Continent? Were we part of France or even a French possession, I might be able to see the glimmer of a reason for it. The popular holiday resort of L’Ile de Ré, for example, three kilometres off La Rochelle, is connected by an impressive bridge, but this is still mainland France. It isn’t a pathway to another nationality or administration – let alone outside the EU.

Who would control access? Would it lie under French jurisdiction, British or ‘meet in the middle’? Would our new coastal extension provide a beacon for those from east and south who’d see ‘British’ at the end of the viaduct.

I doubt these arrivals would be wise or bearing gifts. More likely, they’d come with their ‘human rights’ wrapped tightly around them and no further place to go. It might make the estimated 500 ‘Bob the Builders’ imported to construct the Waterfront Kremlin seem like a Sunday-school outing.

At this point, it’s not clear whether the local promoters actually want a bridge or a tunnel. Clearly their estimate of £1.5 billion is way short of the mark. The structure they keep referring to, namely, the Oresund link between the Danish capital Copenhagen and the Swedish city of Malmo is a combination of both, with a socking great four kilometre island in the middle – because for the moment, nobody has actually built a bridge as long as the 20 kilometre gap between us and the French coast.

What’s more, their 16 kilometre ‘combi’ came in at £3.5bn – and that was ten years ago. They’ll be paying for it for another 25 years, despite revenues from travellers – 25 million in 2007 alone. Their project gained European Regional support because it provided a vital road and rail link between two inter-dependent thriving economies with trade and transit links right across the Continent and a well-established flow of commuter traffic on a day-by-day basis.

So, what are we really looking for? A ‘nice to have’ holiday route for local caravaners in the summertime – certainly not the place to be during a winter force 8 gale! Perhaps it’s the lure of commuting from Ile-et-Vilaine or further afield, where you can find cheaper hollow-brick homes, better supermarkets and terrible TV.

But what, pray, would be the attraction for the French to pour huge amounts of Euros into the project? Do we any longer produce anything for them which requires bulk transport? What great marketing or employment opportunities would open up for them on our 5 x 9 mile, off-shore haven, where we have great difficulty speaking their language, don’t use their currency or share the same clock-time?

And by whom would the opportunistic each-way commuters be taxed? Remember, we are not in the EU, which makes us among Europe’s most disadvantaged when it comes to anything involving movements ‘sans frontiers’.

Please don’t get me wrong. I’m not an isolationist – far from it. I’m up for increased actual and cultural links with the French mainland. I’m all in favour of sensible twinning arrangements with French communities so long as they’re more than merely junket opportunities for members of parish municipalities. I applaud the decision by Hautlieu School to inaugurate an international Baccalaureate, and I’m certainly keen on the development of direct air links to French regional centres. It’s just that I cannot subscribe to any justification for shelling out huge sums of money we can’t afford on a huge project that could very well sink alongside St Catherine’s breakwater, in the watery graveyard of proud intentions.

If the pipe-dreaming pontificaters are so intent on planting their trestles and threading their suspension cables for posterity or a politician’s name-plate, let them look no further than St Aubin’s Bay. With all the spoil about to be dug out from under the Waterfront site, how about transporting it a mere mile or so out to sea, extend the Elizabeth Castle islet to create an exclusive artificial island for luxury dwellings for 1(1)Ks, a brisk golf course, maybe a heliport and deep-water docking for rich cruise-liners. Link it all to shore with a stunning ‘architecturally approved’ bridge structure.

Just a minute: In the interests of inter-Bailiwick solidarity, why not a bridge over the sea to Sarnia? Come back to me by 1 April.