What does "absent from the UK for at least a whole tax year" actually mean?

On Wed, 26 Aug 2009 04:46:06 -0700 (PDT), PeterSaxton <...@petersaxton.co.uk

A taxpayer left the UK in 2006-2007 intending to work abroad for
several years.

She returned to the UK for about 10 days in 2007-2008 tax year.

She returned to the UK on 11 April 2008 and started work in the UK on
13 April 2008.

The HMRC booklet: Residence, Domicile and the Remittance Basis

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/cnr/hmrc6.pdf

"8.5 Leaving the UK to work abroad as an employee
If you are leaving the UK to work abroad full-time, you will only
become
not resident and not ordinarily resident from the day after the day of
your
departure, as long as:
• you are leaving to work abroad under a contract of employment for at
least a whole tax year
• you have actually physically left the UK to begin your employment
abroad
and not, for example, to have a holiday until you begin your
employment
• you will be absent from the UK for at least a whole tax year
• your visits to the UK after you have left to begin your overseas
employment will
- total less than 183 days in any tax year, and
- average less than 91 days a tax year. This average is taken over the
period of absence up to a maximum of four years – see 8.3 which will
show you how to work out this average. Any days you spend in the UK
because of exceptional circumstances beyond your control, for example
an illness which prevents you from travelling, are not normally
counted
for this purpose.
If you do not meet all of these conditions, you will remain resident
and
ordinarily resident in the UK unless paragraph 8.2 applies to you.
If your employment comes to an end and you do not return to the UK it
will
be necessary to consider if you continue to be not resident and not
ordinarily resident in the UK."

A11. Residence in the United Kingdom: year of commencement or
cessation of residence

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/senew/se42850.htm

"The Income and Corporation Taxes Acts make no provision for splitting
tax years in relation to residence and an individual who is resident
in the United Kingdom for any year of assessment is chargeable on the
basis that he is resident for the whole year.
But where an individual:

comes to the United Kingdom to take up permanent residence or to stay
for at least two years, or
ceases to reside in the United Kingdom if he has left for permanent
residence abroad,
liability to United Kingdom tax which is affected by residence is
computed by reference to the period of his residence here during the
year. It is a condition that the individual should satisfy the Board
of Inland Revenue that prior to his arrival he was, or on his
departure is, not ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom. The
concession would not apply, for example, where an individual who had
been ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom left for intended
permanent residence abroad but returned to reside here before the end
of the tax year following the tax year of departure.
This concession is extended to the years of departure and return
where, subject to certain conditions, an individual goes abroad for
full time service under a contract of employment. These conditions
are-

the individual absence from the United Kingdom and the employment
itself both extend over a period covering a complete tax year, and
any interim visits to the United Kingdom during the period do not
amount to
183 days or more in any tax year, or
an average of 91 days or more in a tax year (the average is taken over
the period of absence up to a maximum of four years, and
for years up to and including 1992-93, all the duties of the
employment are performed abroad or any duties the individual performs
in the United Kingdom are incidental to duties abroad.
Where the concession applies and the tax year is split, Section 128
Finance Act 1995 (limit on income chargeable on non-residents: Income
Tax) does not apply for the period for which an individual is treated
as not resident. That Section only applies to complete years of non-
residence."

My view is that "the individual absence from the United Kingdom and
the employment itself both extend over a period covering a complete
tax year" means the taxpayer should not visit the UK in the tax year
but when I phone HMRC they seem to think that spending 10 days in the
UK in the tax year still counts as absence from the UK!

Can anybody shed any light on this?