Miller Group: all is sweetness and light among shareholders

The rebel members of the Miller family, led by former chairman James Miller, have buried the hatchet and the potential for a break-up or sale of the £1.2bn-a-year turnover Scottish company has evaporated.

The shareholders holding 64% of Miller’s shares no longer wish to put them on the open market, ending speculation over the group’s future.

James Miller, former chairman, had led the disgruntled family members who formed the Aligned Shareholder Group (ASG) and called in Ernst & Young in the belief that there might be a pot of gold they were missing out on.

Ernst & Young’s verdict, however, was that its calculation of the value of Miller’s shares was no different from the one already on offer through an internal price market.

The result is that the group’s 2,000 somewhat unsettled employees can been comforted by the fact that there will be no fundamental change in the well-run group that made a handsome pre-tax profit of £80m last year.

Keith Miller, chief executive, said that a sale was never going to happen. “We have more than £300m of shareholder funds. The company is very powerful. We are 100% secure as an independent.”

A family council has been set up with a clear investor governance framework. It will allow the chairman, chief executive and finance director to meet family groupings and deal with shareholder issues such as share liquidity.

“We are halfway there,” said Keith Miller.

James Miller, cousin to Keith, has taken a much more placatory line in his latest statement to the press. “While it has become clear that a small group of shareholders would like to sell some shares, this can be dealt with through existing arrangements,” he said.

“Press speculation on the future of Miller has been unhelpful and counter-productive in achieving a satisfactory solution for some of our shareholders.”

James has thrown his weight behind the Miller board and the way it is moving the group forward.

Keith added: “We are all very happy to have resolved everything amicably. A few shareholders may want to sell. The volume is not significant.”

Turning to current trading in the group’s four operating divisions, Keith reported that:

• private house building is having a tough time
• the construction division has never been stronger, the future workload having doubled in the past 12 months
• development operations now stretch into nine European countries and are firing away well - being very liquid offers good opportunities in the current market
• the group’s joint venture in coal has won a £150m contract in South Wales and is going well, the deal being to supply the RWE power station at Aberthaw with a million tonnes a year for the next 10 years. Following the closure of a nearby deep mine, the jv has become the UK’s biggest coal extraction project. A dedicated link into Aberthaw is up and running.