Heathrow Terminal 5 was beset by problems this week as it emerged that remedial work was being carried out on the building’s roof and the project is exceeding its M&E budget by £56,000 an hour.

BAA originally estimated it would take 6 million man hours to complete M&E work on on the Richard Rogers Partnership (RRP) project. That figure was exceeded last month, which suggests that the £56,000 per hour required to pay for the project’s 2,000 M&E workers and materials is outside the original budget.

The roof is also leaking, although BAA says the repairs fall under “routine snagging work”.

The client has denied that the project is over budget, despite admitting that the original man hours budget had been revised.

A BAA spokesperson said: “Six million was a baseline figure estimated in 2002. Since then, the project has added to its scope, but it is not over budget. These sums are factored in.”

n Lord Rogers’ former partner, Marco Goldschmied, is to become the prime landlord for the site occupied by RRP’s office and will press for a rent rise for its Thames riverfront offices.

Goldschmied has agreed a deal to buy out the property interests of Rogers and the practice’s third founding partner, John Young.