A HUGE programme of vital road improvements in Southampton will not go ahead after the government rejected a £300m bid by the city council.

The money would have allowed the council to take out a contract with a private company which would carry out the works while they were paid for over 25 years.

But the city, one of nine local authorities to bid for the cash, had its plea turned down and now bosses are being forced to look elsewhere to find the funding to make the repairs.

Tory Cabinet member for transport Gavin Dick said: "We're greatly disappointed that the government has let us down.

"We won't be able to fix the roads to the level we would have liked. It would have allowed us to fix all the roads in the city.

"We will now just be doing maintenance and not actually replacements which is a great shame."

The cash was part of a national £600m pot that was available through the government's private finance initiative (PFI).

Nine bids totalling £3bn were made for the cash with one local authority bidding for the whole pot.

Highways chiefs saw the PFI cash as a major investment to address the poor state of the city's road network, which has an estimated £50m backlog of repairs.

Cllr Dick said transport bosses were now looking at alternative public private partnerships or tie-ups with neighbouring councils to find extra cash.

In the meantime new two-year, short-term, maintenance contracts were being put out to tender ahead of a major ten-year road improvements contract.

The council plans, with the help of borrowing, to double its roads budget to £6m next year.

The council has made a separate smaller PFI bid for up to £22m to replace ageing streetlights.

A Department for Transport spokesman said all the authorities that lost out on the PFI cash were offered feedback on why they were unsuccessful.

Hounslow, Isle of Wight, Redbridge, Sheffield and York were invited to submit more detailed bids by February.