(Bloomberg) -- Australian investment firms including Macquarie Group Ltd. and AustralianSuper are planning to invest 28.5 billion pounds ($38 billion) in U.K. infrastructure projects in the coming years.
Projects include offshore wind farms, new homes, and urban regeneration works across the country, according to a statement issued by Downing Street on Wednesday after a U.K.-Australia investment meeting.
The investment will help “create jobs and growth in every part of the country, and put the U.K. at the cutting edge of the green industrial revolution,” Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in the statement.
The two countries last year finalized the first post-Brexit trade deal that went beyond rolling over a previous relationship with a European Union trading partner. Among measures in the agreement was a guaranteed right for Australian businesses to bid for a variety of U.K. government contracts.
The U.K. has long been a popular destination for Australian institutional investors. Australia's pension funds have steadily increased their presence in the U.K. and Europe in recent years as they hunt assets outside their home market.
AustralianSuper, the nation's largest pension, is more than doubling the size of its team in London by 2026 as it hunts more property, infrastructure and private equity deals outside Australia. The fund's London office also houses its offshore dealing team responsible for global equities and currencies.
Commitments announced Wednesday include:
- AustralianSuper plans 8 billion pounds in investments including a Canada Water property development
- IFM Investors plans 3 billion pounds of spending to help maintain its existing toll roads and airports, as well as large-scale energy transition projects like carbon capture and solar power
- Lendlease Corp Ltd. will be part of a consortium to invest 5.5 billion pounds in London and Birmingham regeneration projects
- Macquarie plans to back 12 billion pounds of infrastructure projects including offshore wind farms and rural broadband networks
- Worley Ltd. will expand its U.K. operations, creating 1,000 new jobs focused on energy transition projects
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