Nuttall achieves significant turnover growth and maintains profitability

Camberley, 27 April 2007 - Edmund Nuttall Ltd had an excellent trading year during 2006. Turnover improved significantly to £567 million whilst a pre tax profit of £19.8 million represented a margin of 3.5% on an enhanced turnover. These results again confirm Nuttall as one of the leading civil engineering contractors in the UK market.

Improvements in health, safety and environmental performance continue to be strategic priorities. Nuttall’s incident frequency has continued to fall to reach a lowest ever level of 0.53, a figure in the upper quartile of industry performance. The annual trend shows a steady decline from above 1.0 in 2000 to the current level, which represents a year on year improvement of 8.2%. This encouraging downward trend bears testimony to the significant investment made in education programmes highlighting the importance of safe working practices and environmental awareness. The Don’t Walk By safety campaign, which was launched in 2004, will continue for the foreseeable future and has already played an important role in raising awareness, which has contributed to the reduction in the rate of reported accidents. Six RoSPA gold awards were achieved during 2006.

The company has a stated aim to integrate with local communities during the term of a project. This involves interfacing with all key internal and external stakeholders to deliver the best value solution for our clients in the most sustainable fashion. An integral part of our commitment to be a socially responsible business is the partnering programme that has been developed with key members of our supply chain. In 2006 our “Greening the Supply Chain” initiative was launched to assist SMEs (Small Medium Enterprises) in introducing their own environmental management systems.

A number of significant projects were awarded during 2006; these included the £200 million remediation and demolition package on the Olympics site, the £84 million construction of a 24 km stretch of guided busway for Cambridgeshire County Council, the £16 million replacement of the Surtees Bridge on the A66 near Middlesbrough for the Highways Agency, two contracts valued at £31 million for British Nuclear Group at Sellafield for Local Sludge Treatment and a Product & Residue Store, and finally three contracts valued at £19.6 million to undertake work for Network Rail as part of the WCRM Trent Valley Four Tracking project.

Of the numerous schemes successfully delivered during 2006 the Clyde Arc bridge across the River Clyde in Glasgow together with the two ECI (Early Contractor Involvement) road contracts at Great Barford and Stoke are worthy of note. The Clyde Arc employed leading edge pre-casting technology to construct the deck slab whilst the two road schemes delivered notable programme efficiencies and enhanced value benefiting from a regime of sequential ECI.

Martin Rogers, Chief Executive, comments: ‘This is a good result consistent with previous years’ performance, which demonstrates the strength in depth of the business and the dedication of Nuttall employees. In addition to a good performance in 2006 the company’s forward order book looks healthy with turnover provided by long term programmes with South West Water, London Underground, Network Rail, Cheshire Highways, Defence Estates and the National Grid. We are providing our regular customers with a reliable service that is better than what is available in the open market; hence over 90% of our workload is awarded by repeat business customers. The early entry into the energy from waste sector together with the nuclear and energy generation markets will provide the catalyst for future growth in years to come. We will continue to work closely with our sister company HBG UK to provide clients with added value solutions for their civil engineering and construction requirements. Successful delivery of projects such as the £29.5 million Liverpool South Parkway transport hub and the £100 million Ferensway shopping complex in Hull underpin the value of this relationship. Finally I am delighted that once again we have seen an improvement in our health, safety and environmental performance, which underpins our sustainability policies.’


Notes to Editors:

Edmund Nuttall is one of the UK’s leading civil engineering contractors, with a current turnover approaching £600 million. The company operates throughout the country and has a strong regional presence with over 20 offices and plant depots. Nuttall is an operating company of the Dutch based construction company Royal BAM Group, which reported for 2006 a consolidated net result of EUR 137 million and a turnover of EUR 8.6 billion.


For further information, contact:

Peter Bishop, Head of Public Relations, Edmund Nuttall Ltd, Telephone 01276 63484, E-Mail peter.bishop@edmund-nuttall.co.uk