Actually this is all part of BA's marketing plan to become "The World's Favourite Airline".
They've been steadily working at ways to drop the "British" out of the name by steadily providing poorer and poorer service to more and more of the domestic and short haul market.
Once they have got rid of all their cabin crew, pilots and ground staff on these routes, they can look to change their name to their ultimate aim of "World Airways" and cater solely to the international market into and out of T5.