British Airways is to axe an early morning "red eye" Edinburgh-Heathrow shuttle.

The 6.35am weekday flight, which is often used by Prime Minister Gordon Brown, will disappear from summer 2009 schedules, the airline confirmed last night.

The move involves cutting the number of weekday return flights between Edinburgh and Heathrow from 11 to 10.

British Airways, which announced last month that its profits in the first six months of the financial year had fallen by 92% to £52m, says the first flight of the day will now be at 7.05am. The airline believes that should not cause problems for commuters.

A BA spokeswoman said: "We are facing the most challenging trading environment in the history of aviation and we must take every measure to ensure that every part of our business is operating viably. We continually amend our schedule to take account of business requirements and in the interests of our operation as a whole.

"Even with the change to the Edinburgh to Heathrow schedule, we will continue to operate more services to Heathrow from Edinburgh - and Scotland as a whole, serving Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen - than any other airline."