Boris Johnson on Thursday pledged £700 million ($815 million) in funding for the new Sizewell C nuclear power station, as he prepares to hand over power as UK prime minister. The cash, unveiled at the Sizewell site in eastern England, comes as he seeks to improve UK energy security and fend off criticism over rocketing domestic fuel prices. Sizewell C is expected to be constructed in partnership with French energy firm EDF and could power the equivalent of about six million homes. “We need to pull our national finger out and get on with Sizewell C,” Johnson said in one of his last major policy speeches as prime minister. “That’s why we’re putting £700 million into the deal, just part of the £1.7 billion of government funding available for developing a large-scale nuclear project to final investment stage in this parliament. “In the course of the next few weeks I am absolutely confident that it will get over the line.” Sizewell C would create “tens of thousands of jobs”, he vowed. The government had already given the go-ahead in July to the plant to generate low-carbon electricity. Johnson added it would be “madness” not to go ahead with the project which would “fix the energy needs, not just of this generation but of the next”.