Report of the directors (continued)

Creditor days
Since the Company has no trade creditors, the disclosure of creditor days does not apply.

Policy on payment of suppliers
The Group applies a policy of agreeing payment terms with each of its major suppliers and abides by these terms, subject to satisfactory performance by the suppliers.

Substantial shareholders
The Company has been advised of the following notifiable interests in the issued ordinary capital of the Company as at the close of business on 17 February 2005:

	Ordinary shares million	Percentage of issued ordinary share capital
Hanover Investors Partners	65,695,000	15.23%
Silchester International Investors	64,388,539	14.93%
M&G Investment Management	40,120,947	9.28%
Brandes Investment Partners	22,042,573	5.10%

Schroder Investment Management advised the Company that it had a notifiable interest in 48,629,928 ordinay shares (representing 11.25% of the issued ordinary share capital) as at the close of business on 2 March 2005.

There were no changes in the notifiable interests as set out above between 17 Febuary and 2 March 2005.

Auditors
PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP resigned as auditors of the Company on 18 June 2004 and KPMG Audit Plc was appointed to fill a casual vacancy.

A resolution to appoint KPMG Audit Plc as auditors of the Company will be proposed at the forthcoming Annual General Meeting to be held on 28 April 2005.

By order of the Board
Philip Brown
Company Secretary
17 February 2005