Britain's cash-strapped government could lease chunks of its road network to the private sector as Prime Minister David Cameron seeks to improve the country's infrastructure to stop it falling further behind its competitors. The move to seek help from sovereign wealth funds and private investors came after news Cameron had only managed to secure two billion pounds from pension funds for new projects by 2013 - far short of a 20 billion pound target.
"The truth is, we are falling behind, falling behind our competitors," Cameron told an audience of engineers in London. "There is now an urgent need to repair the decades-long degradation of our national infrastructure. We need to look urgently at the options for getting large-scale private investment into the national roads network - from sovereign wealth funds, pension funds, and other investors."
Cameron said his Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government, due to publish its 2012 budget and economic updates on Wednesday, would look at introducing more tolling on new roads. Britain has only one toll on a major highway, the 27-mile M6 toll Birmingham relief road.
Despite the lower-than-projected use of that road, analysts and some investors said the possibility of introducing more tolls could prove attractive. "They are slightly more risky, compared to say a regulated utility or contracted power station - they are more economically sensitive," said Surinder Toor, European head of infrastructure at J.P. Morgan Asset Management.