Aim: for steadily increasing ROCE which exceeds our cost of capital. This ensures that we add shareholder value over the long term. In recent years we have successfully widened the margin between the cost of our capital and the returns we generate by investing it.
During 2006, the post tax return on average capital employed improved to 18.5%.

| |
2006 |
2005 |
2004 |
2003 |
2002 |
2001 |
| PBIT (normalised) |
225 |
183 |
156* |
131 |
107* |
77 |
| Avg capital (£m) |
880 |
776 |
696 |
645 |
575 |
464 |
| Tax (%) |
27.7 |
27.7 |
28.1 |
28.1 |
29.1 |
29.8 |
*excluding exceptional items