Notes to the Company accounts

1 Employees

	Period ended 31 July 2007 £m	Period ended 5 August 2006 £m
Staff costs during the period
Wages and salaries	148.3	91.7
Social security	14.7	10.0
Cost of share-based incentive plans	7.2	9.9
Pension costs (note 8)	21.6	15.7
	191.8	127.3

For details of Smiths Group plc’s employee share option schemes and other share-based plans refer to note 31 relating to the Group accounts.

The average number of persons employed during the period was 6,555 (2006: 3,460).

Smiths Group divisions:
Smiths Detection, Smiths Medical, Smiths Specialty Engineering