Are the problems of T5 systemic or transitional? What is going to be the effect of oil.
The T5 problems are transitional I would say, largely caused by opening the Terminal before it was finished or properly tested. The bag store part of the baggage system does sound like a bit of a vastly over ambitious technological black hole that may be wildly unrealistic for the amount of baggage it has to store. One computer glitch and it all goes pair shaped with no apparent manual fallback position. Somebody also needs to challenge the complete obsession with security that makes manual fallback arrangements such as passengers moving their own bags to and from the gates as a last resort prohibited.
This seems to be a failing though of modern airport terminals that are too big and spread out for their own good. At ludicrously sprawling single terminal Palma (Majorca) airport if the computerised baggage season goes U/S in peak season then all check in also has to stop because the distance to the gates (up to 1km) is so ridiculously large that passengers are not thought to be able to cope (also the security scanning arrangements designed for hand luggage probably could not cope). In high season in July and August Palma can be significantly busier in terms of passenger numbers than Gatwick. The total annual passenger throughput of single terminal Palma (two old terminals tacked together by a monstrous new central building now handling all checkin and baggage reclaim and with numerous additional highly remote gates involving very long walks added) is about the same as the projected final capacity of T5. Terminals this big with a single baggage system mean disaster on a much bigger scale when things go wrong. The only reason Palma does not regularly implode is because almost no one changes flights so the consequences of bagage system failure are less disastrous and vast amounts of baggage are not kicking around in the system waiting to move from one flight to the other.
Not so sure about the oil price outlook. However BA is not based on a fast passenger growth model like Ryanair or Easyjet and the world as a whole is getting richer so they ought to be able to sustain current passenger numbers barring a total global economic meltdown. If air travel becomes vastly more expensive in real terms due to oil pice then those who can still afford to travel at all may prefer a quality operator like BA. Ryanair and Easyjet have far more to fear from plans to curb growth in total passenger numbers and airport capacity by western governments for environmental and global warming agenda type reasons. If passenger growth stops and their ticket prices double or treble due to higher oil costs then their business models (with huge commitments to new aircraft deliveries) may implode.