Hello and welcome to today's independent travel podcast with me Simon Calder. It's Wednesday the 24th of

April, yes, almost one third of the way through the year. And London Heathrow has this morning

reported a record number of passengers travelling through in the first three months

of 2024. They handled 18.5 million passengers and that's 200,000 a day on average, the best

they've ever seen. Most of the growth seems to have come from places like India, East Asia, North America,

Latin America. But to find out more and also to hear how the airport intends to handle a series

of strikes which are coming down the road in a few days' time, I've been speaking to the chief financial officer, Javier Icavi.

Record passenger numbers, an average of 200,000 per day, you're probably going to take the rest of the year off, aren't you?

I would love, but unfortunately, I unfortunately have a commitment to passengers because I think that summer

is coming very, very strong.

But as you mentioned, Simon, we are very proud of the amount of passengers that we have

been able to serve in the first part of the year, but also more importantly, and as you

know, well, the type of service that we have been able to provide.

So we are extremely proud and very grateful for the team, but we have

a very busy summer ahead. The problem is that you say, and you will know if anybody does, that

there's a 400 million pound gap in your accounts. Tell us where that comes from and what you're

going to do about it. Well, I think it comes very much from the outcome from the regulator.

As you know, the CA set charges for Hydro in March last year.

We appealed that to the CMA and we were not successful.

And that resulted in a significant reduction in charges that we have seen more than 20% reduction

at the start of this year.

And obviously that means that that will generate a 400 million gap over the five-year period

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