End of the line as Lockhead retires as head of FirstGroup

Published on Wednesday 22 September 2010 15:54

SIR Moir Lockhead, chief executive of rail and bus giant First Group, yesterday brought down the curtain on a 50 year career in the industry by announcing his retirement. Lockhead, 65, will be succeeded by Tim O'Toole, the former managing director of London Underground.

• Sir Moir Lockhead. Pic: Getty

American O'Toole, who was appointed as deputy chief executive of the group in June, will take over from Lockhead on 1 November. But Lockhead will stay on until 31 March for a five-month handover period.

O'Toole had initially joined the board as a non-executive director in 2009. Yesterday he confirmed that the headquarters for the firm would remain in Aberdeen and that he will split his time between the US and Aberdeen, crossing the Atlantic every two weeks.

More than 50 per cent of the firm's business is in the US following its 1.9 billion acquisition in 2007 of Laidlaw, which owns the iconic Greyhound bus business. The firm also runs First Student, North America's largest provider of yellow school buses.

Martin Gilbert, the group's chairman, said O'Toole's experience in working in transport in both the US and UK was "crucial" to his appointment.

"We have been fortunate to find someone with the necessary international experience," said Gilbert.

He said that O'Toole's appointment was "evolution not revolution" and that the firm would remain committed to organic growth, ruling out any change in strategy for the group.

Lockhead said he had always planned to retire at 65, although the search to find his successor has been fraught with difficulty. Former chief operating operator Dean Finch was widely considered to be a likely successor before he unexpectedly left to join Tube Lines in early 2009. Another potential successor, Ellis Watson, left the business to run Simon Cowell's entertainment firm, Syco, in March.

When O'Toole joined the firm, another potential contender for the top role, Nicola Shaw, left the business although the firm said her departure was unrelated to the choice of successor. Shaw ran the group's FirstBus division, which is now being run by Mary Grant, who is also head of the firm's UK rail business.

Gilbert said: "It has not been easy to find a worthy successor to someone like Sir Moir. I and the rest of the board are confident we have found the right person."

Lockhead said he planned to become "chairman of the farm" once he retired.

He denied outright that he had any plans to become the next chairman of Network Rail. "I'm going to find other things to do of my own choice," he said.

He added: "By the time I retire I will have worked here for over 50 years. I think I am looking for something different."More importantly we found the right person and that has been the real test of when we can do this."

He said the timing for the appointment was partly so that O'Toole could be involved in presenting the firm's half-year results in November.

"It is a real opportunity for Tim to get involved in all of that and meet shareholders. By the time I go by the end of March his feet will be well under the table and I think that is the right thing to do," said Lockhead.

He said leading the employee buyout of the Grampian local authority's Aberdeen bus business for 5.5m in 1989 was his career high point.

"If it hadn't been for being able to buy the company here in Aberdeen we would never have got off the starting block," he said.

KNIGHT OF THE ROAD

KNIGHTED in 2008, Sir Moir Lockhead was born in the mining village of Sedgefield, County Durham.

He left school at 15 to become an apprentice mechanic and went to college and attended night school.

In 1989, Lockhead led an employee buyout of the council-owned Aberdeen city municipal bus operator Grampian Regional Transport (GRT) Group, when he was general manager. FirstGroup was formed as FirstBus in 1995 through the merger of the Badgerline Group and GRT. Lockhead took the company from 500 staff to become a transport giant in Britain and America, running bus, rail and freight services worth 6 billion a year.

Married with four children, the group's departing chief executive lives on his family's 300-acre farm near Aberdeen.

He earned 643,000 last year after waiving his bonus entitlement and holds share awards worth some 4.5 million.

TRANSATLANTIC STAR

TIM O'Toole, an American, pictured below who joined London Underground in 2003, was praised for his handling of the 7 July bombings.

His co-ordination of the evacuation of thousands of passengers and staff to safety after the attacks in 2005, plus the quick resumption of services on the Tube network, earned him an honorary CBE.

At the time of his departure from London Underground in February 2009. O'Toole said: "I am sad to leave LU but after six years in London it is time to go home."

The English literature graduate worked as a lawyer before making his name in the US rail freight business, joining Conrail in 1984. He was named Conrail's president and chief executive in 1998.

Appointed to the board of FirstGroup as a non-executive director in May 2009, O'Toole was made chief operating officer and deputy chief executive in June 2010. He is a non-executive director of CSX Corporation, a US rail freight company.