KEY POINTS:
Another top executive at BAA was shunted into the departure lounge yesterday as the house cleaning effort instituted by its new chief executive gathers pace.
The embattled airport group announced that Mark Bullock, the managing director of Heathrow who oversaw the disastrous opening of the new Terminal 5 in March, had "chosen to leave" the company.
BAA said Bullock departed of his own volition after receiving a promotion last month.
Colin Matthews, the chief executive brought in on April 1 to overhaul BAA, unveiled a management shake-up three weeks ago that eliminated several top jobs at the group and elevated Bullock to the executive board. Central to Matthews' effort to right BAA was to take a more hands-on approach to managing Heathrow, the world's busiest international airport.
Bullock's post under the new structure would have meant less daily involvement at the airport, a role, he said, that he did not covet.
"The managing director role at the airport will change substantially under the new structure being introduced by Colin Matthews and, while I understand and support those important changes and the renewed focus on day-to-day operations, the time is clearly right for me to move on and take on new challenges," he said.
He follows other executives out the door. In the days since the T5 debacle led to more than 500 cancelled flights and thousands of lost or delayed bags, Gareth Kirkwood, head of logistics at Heathrow, and personnel chief David Noyes left.
Bullock will be replaced by Mike Brown, the chief operating officer of London Underground, who will join in September.
The ructions come just days after BAA's major shareholders - Ferrovial, the Spanish construction group, GIC, Singapore's Sovereign Wealth Fund and Canadian pension fund Caisse de Deput et Placement du Quebec - were forced to inject £400 million ($1 billion) into BAA to convince bondholders to begin discussions on refinancing the group's near £10 billion debt.
- INDEPENDENT
