Funding Infrastructure

Our Executive Chairman, Sir Merrick Cockell, is also the Deputy Chairman of the London Pensions Fund Authority and in this capacity wrote a letter on funding infrastructure, which was published in the Financial Times yesterday – 18th November 2014.

In response to recent reports on the possibility of the Qatari royal family investing substantial sums in regeneration around stations on the planned HS2 route Sir Merrick highlights how existing capital is being overlooked.

The Local Government Pension Scheme has assets of approximately £178bn across 89 funds and there are clear benefits to them being able to sensibly invest in local infrastructure. While it could be argued that the LGPS members do not have sufficient scale to invest in complex alternative assets this could, and should, be rectified.

‘LGPS funds should be able to pool assets and expertise in order to access more complex, liability-matching investments. At LPFA we have proposed voluntary asset liability management partnerships across the LGPS, which would provide all funds with the opportunity to invest actively together in a wider range of assets, including infrastructure.’