In addition to providing reliable services, we seek to ensure the safety of our passengers, staff and others. Safety is monitored in various ways, including through a range of KPIs. Disposed businesses are excluded from the safety KPIs.

Five of the more important safety KPI’s are reported below:

	Target	Year ended	Year ended	Year ended
		30 April 2010	30 April 2009	30 April 2008
UK Bus – number of blameworthy accidents per 1 million miles travelled	To decrease each year – ultimate target is zero	21.9	see below	see below
US – number of blameworthy accidents per 1 million miles travelled		8.8	9.3	see below
South West Trains – workforce lost time injuries per 1,000 staff		2.0	1.7	1.9
East Midlands Trains – workforce lost time injuries per 1,000 staff		1.6	2.6	2.1
West Coast Trains – workforce lost time injuries per 1,000 staff		1.9	1.6	1.5

Due to development of our safety reporting systems to standardise and enhance the reporting of safety indicators, certain KPIs are not presented above as they would not be comparable to later years.

The Group seeks to increase long-term value to its shareholders. While the Group aims to take a long-term perspective on shareholder value, it also monitors the financial performance of each of its businesses in the shorter term. For the Group as a whole, the key measure of short-term financial performance is earnings per share before exceptional items and intangible asset expenses (“Adjusted EPS”). Adjusted EPS is calculated based on the profit attributable to equity shareholders (adjusted to exclude exceptional items and intangible asset expenses) divided by the weighted average number of ordinary shares ranking for dividend during the relevant period.

Adjusted EPS was as follows:

		Year ended 30 April
	Target	2010 pence	2009 pence	2008 pence
Adjusted EPS	To increase in excess of inflation	18.7p	22.9p	20.3p

A key element underpinning the Group’s strategy is to deliver organic growth in revenue. The following measures of organic growth are monitored in respect of the Group’s three divisions:

• UK Bus – growth in passenger journeys measured as the percentage increase in the number of passenger journeys relative to the equivalent period in the previous year.
  
• Rail – growth in passenger miles measured as the percentage increase in the number of miles travelled by passengers relative to the equivalent period in the previous year.
  
• North America – growth in constant currency revenue from continuing operations measured as the percentage increase in revenue relative to the equivalent period in the previous year

The measures vary by division reflecting differences in the underlying businesses – for example, a significant proportion of the revenue in North America is not determined on a “per passenger” basis.

Throughout this Annual Report, references to passenger volume growth for UK Bus or Rail businesses mean growth determined on the basis set out here.

All of these growth KPIs involve a degree of estimation in respect of passenger volumes and are normalised to exclude businesses that have not been held by the Group for the whole of both periods.

The organic growth KPIs were as follows:

	Target	Year ended 30 April 2010 Growth %	Year ended 30 April 2009 Growth %	Year ended 30 April 2008 Growth %
UK Bus passenger journeys	Positive growth each year	(0.4)%	3.2%	3.6%
UK Rail passenger miles
– South West Trains		(1.1)%	2.2%	5.7%
– East Midlands Trains		(0.4)%	1.6%	2.9%
– Virgin Rail Group – West Coast Trains		20.4%	(1.5)%	8.3%
North America revenue		(3.4)%	7.2%	4.6%

The growth in passenger miles shown above for East Midlands Trains in the year ended 30 April 2008 represents the growth for the period from 11 November 2007 (when the Group began operating East Midlands Trains) to 30 April 2008 when compared to the equivalent businesses under their previous ownership for the corresponding prior year period. During the year ended 30 April 2009, Virgin Rail Group experienced numerous Network Rail possessions, over-runs and days of poor performance and this is reflected in the decline in passenger miles shown above for that year.

The declines in passenger volumes at UK Bus and UK Rail and the decline in North America revenue, in the year ended 30 April 2010 shows the impact of the tough economic conditions during the year. At Virgin Rail Group the impact has been offset by the increase in services following a new timetable being introduced in December 2008.

We aim to provide a reliable service to support our organic growth strategy. Our measures of service delivery include:

• UK Bus – reliability measured as the percentage of planned miles to be operated that were operated.
  
  
• Rail – punctuality measured on the basis of the DfT’s Public Performance Measure (moving annual average) being the percentage of trains that arrive at their final destination within 5 minutes (or 10 minutes for inter-city services) of their scheduled arrival time having called at all scheduled stations. References to rail punctuality throughout this Annual Report refer to punctuality calculated on this basis.

Due to the nature of the North American business, there is no single measure of service delivery for the North American division as a whole.

The service delivery KPIs were as follows:

		Year ended 30 April
	Target	2010 %	2009 %	2008 %
UK Bus reliability	>99.0%	99.3%	99.5%	99.4%
UK Rail punctuality
– South West Trains	>90.0%	93.0%	93.3%	92.2%
– East Midlands Trains	>85.0%	92.5%	89.3%	87.2%
– Virgin Rail Group – West Coast Trains	>85.0%	85.3%	79.7%	85.9%

The strength of our business is built on the quality of our employees. We monitor staff turnover which is measured as the number of employees who left the Group (other than through business disposals) during the period as a proportion of the total average employees during the period.

Staff turnover for the last three years in our continuing businesses was as follows:

		Year ended 30 April
	Target	2010 %	2009 %	2008 %
UK Bus staff turnover	To decrease each year	15.0%	18.3%	24.0%
UK Rail staff turnover
– South West Trains		7.4%	11.3%	10.7%
– East Midlands Trains		7.3%	8.3%	5.8%
– Virgin Rail Group – West Coast Trains		3.6%	5.3%	5.5%
North America staff turnover		20.1%	20.2%	21.7%

The increases in staff turnover at South West Trains and East Midlands Trains in the year ended 30 April 2009 are driven by redundancies in relation to cost reduction plans.