Mears Regulatory News (MER)

21 April 2010

Mears Group PLC

("Mears" or "the Group")

£170m Contract with London Borough of Lambeth

Repairs, Maintenance and Improvement Partnership

Mears is pleased to announce that, subject to leaseholder consultation, the London Borough of Lambeth intend to award a long-term partnership contract to provide responsive repairs, void refurbishment, estate management, decent homes and planned maintenance. The contract relates to the North housing region which includes around 8,000 of the 20,100 tenanted homes within Lambeth. 

The 7 year contract; (with an extension of up to a further 3 years dependant on performance) is valued at £170 million (including extension) and is expected to commence in October 2010.

Commenting, Bob Holt, Chairman of Mears, said:

"Mears has long been recognised as market leader in terms of operational performance and tenant satisfaction in the Social Housing arena.

Consistent with our strategy of winning quality contracts that provide clear and sustainable margins, Mears once again achieved outstanding scores in the competitive tendering process for the quality of our offering focused on service delivery and tenant satisfaction.

The new contract award is designed to deliver tangible improvements into the community. Lambeth's partnership ethos creates long term opportunities for its partners who are committed to delivering the quality and value for money I have referred to. The tenant centric service is set to improve their lives and the community in which they live. We look forward to serving the tenants of Lambeth for many years to come.

The size of the Mears social housing bid pipeline for contract tenders remains extremely healthy at £3.5 billion and we continue to target customers who share our view of long term partnering arrangements."

About Mears www.mearsgroup.co.uk (tickers: MER.L MER.LN MER.PL)

Mears is a leading social housing repairs and maintenance service provider to Local Authorities and Registered Social Housing Landlords in the UK and has a leading position in the UK Local Authorities' outsourced domiciliary care market, providing personal care services to people in their own homes.

Mears employs in excess of 11,000 people and provides maintenance and repairs services to 500,000 homes nationwide. Mears also provides over 150,000 hours of domiciliary care to 20,000 service users each week.

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