Share Buy Back

British Empire Sec & Gen Tst PLC
19 March 2002



At the Annual General Meeting of the Company held on 17 December 2001,
shareholders granted the Company authority to purchase up to 26,094,605
ordinary shares.

The Company announces that it has today repurchased 700,000 ordinary shares at
a price of 196.5p per share.  5,825,000 ordinary shares have been purchased
under the current authority and the issued share capital after the
cancellation of the shares repurchased will be 169,255,089 ordinary shares.

Since 10 December 1998 when the Company first obtained powers to purchase its
own shares, a total of 20,100,000 ordinary shares have been repurchased.



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