Annual General Meeting

Marks & Spencer PLC
19 July 2000

                      ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
                           19 JULY 2000

The following statements have been taken from presentations that
will be made to shareholders at today's Annual General Meeting.

Current UK Trading

At the Preliminary Results presentation on the 23rd May, we
reported current trading for the 8 weeks to 20th May.  With the
additional 8 weeks trading to 15th July, the figures for the last
16 comparable trading weeks are:-

General   3.1% (0.3% like-for-like)
Food      3.4% (1.8% like-for-like)

Total          3.2% (0.9% like-for-like)

These periods differ from the financial reporting dates because of
the inclusion last year of a 53rd week.  The financial reporting
dates run from 2nd April (this year) and 28th March (last year).
The figures for the 15 week financial reporting period are:-

General   1.2% (-1.2% like-for-like)
Food      2.7% (1.3% like-for-like)

Total          1.8% (-0.2% like-for-like)

The difference between the 'comparable trading' and 'financial
reporting' figures will reduce as the year goes on.

We accepted credit cards in all of our stores from the 18th April.
Early indications show purchases using credit cards have accounted
for 11% of sales, with some 4% coming from our own Chargecard.  It
is still too early to draw firm conclusions regarding the long-
term penetration of credit cards.


(Like-for-like sales are estimated by comparing total sales with
new and developed stores excluded.)


                                                                  
New Concept Stores

At the May presentation we referred to the progress of our new
concept stores, which bring together many of the changes we have
put in place in the last year.  Our initial plans called for three
'prototype' concept stores: Sutton was opened on 4th May; Fosse
Park, near Leicester on 7th June; and Kensington will open at the
end of July.

The results from the stores opened to date, both in terms of sales
and customer reaction, have been very good, and we are therefore
extending the same treatment to a further 20 stores.  Combined
with two new stores opening soon (London Colney and a new store in
Southampton), we will have a total of 25 stores in the new concept
format by the end of the calendar year.  These stores will
represent approximately 2 million sq ft (around 16%) of UK selling
space.

The results of the first new concept stores have comfortably
exceeded our cost of capital and we believe the additional stores
will deliver similar success.  The capital costs of the changes to
the 20 stores will be approximately £60 million.

We will provide information on the next phase of the rollout at
the time of our Christmas trading statement.


Commenting on current trading and the new concept stores Marks &
Spencer Chairman Luc Vandevelde said,

'We have seen further polarisation within the highly competitive
UK clothing market, with better branded offers at one end of the
market and discounters at the other end.  In such an environment,
sales for the last quarter show no more than a continued trend of
stabilisation in our UK trading position.

The market will remain tough for the foreseeable future, and we
have undertaken significant change within our organisation to
refocus on our customers and compete effectively in this
environment.  Our new concept store format is one very visible
example of this change and represents our vision for a new look
and feel for Marks & Spencer.  This format has been very
successful in both Sutton and Fosse Park, and we are confident
that the new concept store brings us closer to the needs of our
customers'.

Board Change - Sir Martin Jacomb

Sir Martin Jacomb is not standing for re-election and therefore
retires at the conclusion of today's AGM having reached the age of
70 in the preceding year.