Notes to the consolidated financial statements
Year ended 31 July 2009

4. Exceptional items

Exceptional items are those material items which, by virtue of their size or incidence, are presented separately in the income statement to enable a full understanding of the Group’s financial performance.

Exceptional items included in operating profit from continuing operations are analysed by segment as follows:

	2009 £m	2008 (restated) £m
UK and Ireland	(183)	(12)
France	(20)	(21)
Nordic	(11)	(3)
Central and Eastern Europe	(85)	(2)
European central costs	(3)	(4)
Europe	(302)	(42)
US plumbing and heating	(80)	(21)
Canada	(6)	(5)
North America plumbing and heating	(86)	(26)
North America loan services	(31)	–
North America	(117)	(26)
Group central costs	(39)	(2)
Group	(458)	(70)

Exceptional items included in operating profit from continuing operations are analysed by purpose as follows:

	2009 £m	2008 (restated) £m
Staff redundancy costs	(75)	(29)
Provisions for future lease rentals on closed branches and asset write-downs	(271)	(41)
Restructuring costs	(346)	(70)
Write-down of construction loan portfolio arising from the separation from Stock Building Supply	(31)	–
Impairment of software assets under construction	(41)	–
Loss on disposal of businesses and revaluations of disposal groups	(40)	–
Group	(458)	(70)

In addition the Group’s associate undertaking also incurred restructuring costs during the year. The Group’s share of the after tax cost of these restructuring actions of £6 million has been disclosed as an exceptional item.

Exceptional items relating to discontinued operations are detailed in note 9.