BAA To Cut 700 Jobs As Growth Slows

BAA To Cut 700 Jobs As Growth Slows: "Airport operator BAA said on Tuesday it planned to cut 700 jobs under a cost-saving program and posted higher first-half earnings despite rising utility bills and slowing passenger growth.
BAA, which owns London's Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports, reported a 5.2 percent rise in pretax profits as expected after higher retail revenues helped offset the impact of the July 7 bombings in London and a strike at Heathrow.
BAA said pretax profit for the six months to end-September was GBP�366 million (USD$647.4 million) compared with GBP�348 million (USD$615.5 million) a year ago.
The result excluded the impact of investment property revaluations and accounting changes which drove down the net profit result.
The company said it would cut about 700 management and back office jobs out of its 12,000-strong workforce under plans to reduce costs by GBP�45 million (USD$79.6 million) per year from 2008/09.
The program would result in GBP�90 million (USD$159.2 million) of one-off operating costs, it said.
BAA's passenger growth is easing from record rises in recent years when the expansion of low-cost airlines and a recovery in long-haul from a downturn caused by the Iraq war and the outbreak of the SARS virus drove up numbers."