AGM Statement

Ashtead Group PLC
9 October 2000


                              ASHTEAD GROUP PLC
                                PRESS RELEASE
                                      
                           Annual General Meeting
                                      
                        First 5 months revenue up 78%
           * BET USA acquisition integration completed in 70 days
          (* The equipment rental business in the US purchased from
               Rentokil Initial plc on 1 June 2000 for £320m.)

At today's Annual General Meeting of Ashtead Group PLC, the leading UK and US
equipment outsourcer, Peter Lewis, Chairman, said:

'In   June  we  made  the  largest  acquisition  in  our  history.   In   the
circumstances  I  decided  shareholders would welcome  a  longer  than  usual
trading statement about events since.

I  am pleased to be able to report strong Group progress for the year so far.
In the first 5 months to end September, we have increased:

-    total revenue over the previous year by  78%
-    US revenue - 'Sunbelt' - (excluding the BET acquisition) by  56%
-    UK revenue - 'A-Plant' - by  4%.
     Full details are shown at the end of this release.

The  UK  market  remains  highly competitive,  clear  evidence  of  which  is
reflected  in  the  recent  statements of several of  A-Plant's  competitors.
Whilst  A-Plant  is not immune from these conditions, market  leadership  has
given  us  the  capacity to meet customers' expectations on a growing  scale.
This  emphasis on delivering customer satisfaction through the widest product
range, nation-wide availability and growing e-commerce support, will enable A-
Plant  to  continue  to grow largely organically.  It has also  justified  A-
Plant's implementation last week of a national price increase which will help
offset  some  of the costs of the investment we have made in delivering  this
enhanced service.  A-Plant has opened nine new Profit Centres since 1 May and
now has a national network of 270.

Ashtead  Technology which presently operates almost entirely in the  offshore
exploration, production  and  maintenance markets, has achieved a like for
like revenue increase  of   17%.  The prospects for substantial revenue growth
next year have been further enhanced by the continuing high price of oil. 
Today, we are pleased to announce the purchase of the business and assets of 
Response Rentals which specialises in the rental of environmental test and
measurement equipment in North America.  Response will enlarge Ashtead
Technology's existing US business in product, customer base and sphere of
activities with a predominantly on-shore profile compared with our current
off-shore bias.  The price of $5.8m is a multiple of 3.2x Response's earnings
before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation in the year to 31 December
1999.  Further details are contained in a separate press release issued today
and posted  on our website.

And  it  is  America, which has been at the centre of your Group's  strategic
planning for over 2 years, that is now beginning to deliver the rewards  that
your board expected when it decided to make a quality platform acquisition to
add to Sunbelt.  The strength of the management team we have assembled in the
decade  since we began our business in America is demonstrated by  the  speed
with  which the merger of BET USA into Sunbelt has been accomplished.  Within
70  days  of purchase on 1 June, Ashtead management completed the integration
into  Sunbelt  of the collection of businesses that previously comprised  BET
USA,  virtually all of which had remained largely independent of one  another
under their two previous owners for more than 15 years.

The  benefits  are  already  beginning to  show  and  will  further  manifest
themselves  in  the first full year of our stewardship.  Indeed,  the  future
prospects  in America for Ashtead have never been better.  A management  team
that  has delivered compound annual growth in operating profit over the  last
four  years  of 53% whilst opening 62 new Profit Centers  has now  created  a
unified  pan-American  business in a little  over  2  months.   The  enlarged
Sunbelt now has 151 Profit Centers across America and is that nation's fourth
largest business of its kind yet it has just a c2% market share.

The  Ashtead  Board regularly monitors macro economic conditions in  America.
The  short-term outlook is positive with continuing strong but not  excessive
GDP growth fuelled by spectacular gains in productivity.  If, as is currently
generally  predicted,  the  worst prospect for the  US  economy  is  a  'soft
landing'  - which, in practical terms, would mean that economy continuing  to
grow  as  fast as the UK does normally - we expect to benefit as we did  from
the  comparatively severe UK recession in the early nineties which itself was
the catalyst for Ashtead's sevenfold growth in the seven years to this April.

Sunbelt's special advantages in the United States, which include:

-       our unique business model with its emphasis on local profit motive
which is unmatched by its US rivals;
-       the  Group's  experience of varying business conditions  borne  of 
our origins in the more competitive UK market;
-       the opportunities presented by the 98% of the US market we do not
have; and
-       our proven skills in growing organically which eliminates the need 
for constant acquisitions as the primary means of improving profits

all combine to indicate that Sunbelt will benefit from the growing demand for
the  outsourced  rental solution in all currently forseeable conditions.   It
should also be remembered that the wide spread of Sunbelt's more than 100,000
customer  base goes far beyond new construction and new housing  and  extends
into almost every aspect of commercial and industrial activity.

We  regard meeting the expectations of us this year as important and  we  are
currently  satisfied with the results to date against our internal forecasts.
But,  in  addition, the prospects for sustained growth beyond this  year  are
being  enhanced  by  the customer appeal of our growing range  of  specialist
products,  the  speed  of  the  successful US integration,  our  progress  in
beginning  to turn round the inherited decline in BET USA and the  enthusiasm
for our business model across our enlarged Profit Center network.'



ASHTEAD GROUP PLC

REVENUE SUMMARY


                   Revenues for the     Revenues for the           
                     five months to       five Months to           
                       30 September         30 September   Increase
                     2000      1999         2000    1999          %
                       £m        £m         US$m    US$m           
Sunbelt Rentals                                                    
Excluding BET        68.6      44.0        100.8    64.7        56%
branches
BET branches (for    69.6         -        102.3       -          -
four months - see
note 1 below)
Total               138.2      44.0        203.1    64.7       214%
                                                                   
A-Plant              82.0      78.7        120.5   115.6         4%
                                                                   
Ashtead               4.5       3.9          6.6    35.7        17%
Technology
                                                                   
Group total         224.7     126.6        330.2   186.0        78%
                                                                   
Geographic split     2000      1999                                
of revenues             %         %
US                     62        36                                
UK                     38        64                                
                     100%      100%                                


                                    Notes

1.    Revenues  from  the former BET branches acquired on  1  June  2000  are
included from the date of the acquisition and thus represent revenues for the
four months to September only.
2.       Revenues from the former BET branches include total rental revenues
of 48.1m (US$70.7m).
3.       The  translation  into  US dollars of the Group's  revenues  which 
are accounted  for in sterling has been made for the convenience of US readers
 using the mid-market exchange rate on 2 October 2000 of $1.4694 = £1.
4.       This  announcement and a copy of the presentation being made  today 
by Sunbelt  Rental's management to analysts and investors in  London  will  be
available on our website: www.ashtead-group.com from 1500 hours on 9 October
2000.

Further information

Peter Lewis              )         Ashtead Group PLC        01372 362300
George Burnett           )
Ian Robson               )

Andrew Grant                       Tulchan Communications   0207 353 4200