AGM Statement

4 May 2007 07:00

Clarke(T.) PLC04 May 2007 T.CLARKE CONFIDENT AT AGM AS ORDER BOOK HITS £200 MILLION Speaking at today's Annual General Meeting, Russell Race, Chairman of T. Clarkeplc, ("T. Clarke") the Electrical engineering and contracting Group, will makethe following statement: " The year has started with great promise. Difficulties experienced in thesecond half of last year are now behind us. We have made a number ofimprovements to the process of management controls in both the core London andregional businesses. These improvements, along with the continued strength ofour markets give us much confidence in the medium term prospects for the Group. " Our core market, the commercial property development sector, is continuing togenerate increased demand for our services and we have won a number of newprojects. We must again emphasise the long lead times on some of the largerschemes, which will reflect in revenues for the years 2008 and 2009. The natureof these increasingly complex projects means that we are often working on largerprojects for a number of years. " There is also increased demand for the services of our regional businesses,particularly in retail, housing and education. We have had a good first quarterin terms of order intake and we expect a slow improvement in margin recovery.However, as a consequence of tighter controls in place that improve riskmanagement there will be slower growth in our regional revenues for 2007. Theboard is confident of increased revenues and margins from these businesses for2008 onwards. " Commodity prices, particularly copper, remain volatile but, our costlyexperiences in 2006 have led us to roll out our lock-in agreements, with bothsuppliers and manufacturers, throughout the Group. " Across the Group, our forward order book stands at £200m. This is ahead of thesituation reported last year when we reported an order book of £150m that wasadjusted for revenue from January 2006 to April 2006. Of our total order book,£120m is expected to be accounted for in the current year. " The Group is in good shape. Despite our markets remaining demanding, tradingso far in 2007 has been in line with expectations. In conclusion the Group canlook forward to the exciting, albeit challenging times ahead." -ends- Date: 4th May 2007For further information contact: T. Clarke plc cityPROFILEPat Stanborough, Chief Executive Simon CourtenayJohn Daly, Finance Director William AttwellTel: 020-7358-5000 Tel: 020-7448-3244Web: www.tclarke.co.uk This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange