Richard Cousins: Tributes paid to British executive and family members killed in Sydney seaplane crash

Tributes are being paid to the victims of a seaplane crash that killed a high-profile British executive and his family on New Year’s Eve.

Richard Cousins was on holiday with his fiancée, her daughter and his two sons when the aircraft they were carrying in went down in a river north of Sydney.

The 58-year-old was chief executive of Compass Group, the world’s largest catering company, and was regarded as one of the world’s best-performing CEOs for turning around struggling firms including Tesco.

Officials said he was on a return flight from the picturesque Cottage Point to Rose Bay, in Sydney Harbour, when the seaplane was lost.

His fiancée, 48-year-old journalist Emma Bowden, her 11-year-old daughter Heather Bowden, Mr Cousins’ two sons, William Cousins, 25, and Edward Cousins, 23, and pilot Gareth Morgan, 44, all died at the scene.

Police said the cause of the disaster remains under investigation amid efforts to recover the aircraft from an area of the Hawkesbury river known as Jerusalem Bay.

It came months before Mr Cousins was due to step down from Compass, a FTSE 100 company, in March.

“We are deeply shocked and saddened by this terrible news,” said chairman Paul Walsh.

“It has been a great privilege to know Richard personally and to work with him for the last few years.

“Richard was known and respected for his great humanity and a no-nonsense style that transformed Compass into one of Britain’s leading companies.”

Mr Cousins was ranked the 11th best-performing CEO in the world by the Harvard Business Review, having joined Compass in 2006 amid corruption allegations over contracts with the United Nations.

The company transformed its fortunes under his leadership, as did Tesco when Mr Cousins took over as independent director during an accounting scandal that saw its profits overstated by £250m in 2014.

He had started his career as a market researcher at Cadbury-Schweppes and later served as a non-executive director at firms including HBOS and P&O.

Neighbours at the family home in Tooting, south-west London, described how “distraught” relatives were seen entering the property on Sunday after hearing the news.

Neighbour Lata Maisuria said Heather had recently started at a local secondary school.

“She seemed happy there,” she added. “She really wanted to go to that school, she was looking forward to it.”

Another neighbour, 71-year-old Terry Spry, described the family as “lovely, charming” people.

Ms Bowden was the art editor at OK! and had worked at the magazine for almost 15 years.

Lisa Byrne, the former editor-in-chief, described her as “lovely – a very kind person”.

“She quite regal, very serene, and very well educated,” she added. “I used to call her the Grace Kelly of the office because she had a great aura about her.

“Nothing ever fazed her. We had to change pages at the last minute – things were being altered, features being dropped and pages redrawn – and she was always willing to put in the extra hours.

“She was such a wonderful, calming influence.”

Ms Bowden and Mr Cousins were due to get married this summer, Mrs Byrne said, adding that her friend’s “absolute priority” was Heather, her daughter from a previous relationship.

Mr Cousins, who discussed his passion for cricket in a 2005 interview with The Independent, had lived with his first wife, Caroline (née Thorpe), and their sons in the Chilterns until she died in 2015.

Her brother, Ian Thorpe, said the couple had been happily married until her death.

“Richard always knew where he was going and he achieved it,” he told Sky News.

“He was always very loving. He made my sister very happy until the day she died.”

Mr Thorpe described his nephews as kind and “wonderful fellas” who were “fabulous, well-mannered and brought up properly”.

Their eldest son William was the head of press for Open Britain, a group “fighting against a hard and destructive Brexit”.

MPs said Mr Cousins, who worked on the Remain campaign during the EU referendum, was an “absolute joy” to work with and would be “missed by all”.

Chris Leslie, the former Shadow Chancellor, called him “exceptionally talented”, adding: “Such awful news – a devastating family tragedy.”

Wes Streeting, the Labour MP for Ilford North, called him “such a good and talented guy”, while former frontbencher Alison McGovern said she was “absolutely devastated”, adding: “He always made me laugh, but was so very smart. An absolute joy to work with.”

Roland Rudd, the chairman of Open Britain, said Mr Cousins would be “missed beyond words”.

“Will was an extraordinary young man who was passionate about what he did, who took deep pride in his work and came into the office every day with enthusiasm, energy and determination,” he added.

“Will saw his role at Open Britain as more than a job. For him, it was a cause akin to a crusade to stop Britain crashing out of the EU with no deal or a bad deal… he will be missed beyond words.”

James McGrory, executive director of the group, said staff were “in shock and deep sorrow”.

“We have not just lost a special colleague but a wonderful friend,” he added. “Will’s razor-sharp wit, easy company and generosity will be missed even more than his huge brain, peerless prose and fearless ideas.”

The University of St Andrews said his brother, Edward Cousins, graduated with a history degree over the summer and “had a bright future ahead of him”.

Mr Morgan was remembered as a “deeply respected” and experienced pilot, who had completed more than 9,000 flying hours in seaplanes.

Aaron Shaw, the managing director of Sydney Seaplanes, said he had worked for the firm initially between 2011 and 2014 before moving to fly in the Maldives, and returning in May.

“He was an extremely experienced pilot,” he added, saying Mr Morgan had flown his own family to Palm Beach shortly before Christmas.

“On a personal level he was deeply respected and liked by me and all of the team, as a man and as a pilot. We are devastated by his loss.”

Mr Shaw said he was shocked at what he called a “tragic accident”, which caused the firm to suspend all operations until further notice.

Passing his condolences to the Bowden, Cousins and Morgan families, he said the firm did not know the cause of the accident and was working with police, Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) and the Civil Aviation Safety Authority.

Mr Shaw said Sydney Seaplanes had conducted thousands of flights with a previously “unblemished” safety record since being founded in 2005, seeing it fly famous passengers including Ed Sheeran and Pippa Middleton.

The DHC-2 Beaver seaplane came down off Jerusalem Bay near Cowan, 25 miles north of Sydney centre, at about 3.10pm (4.10am GMT) on Sunday.

Around a dozen recreational boats were in the area at the time and some are believed to have sailed to the crash site in attempts to help, with police appealing for witnesses to come forward.

Detective Superintendent Mark Hutchings, head of the New South Wales marine area command, told a press conference the crash “can only be described as a tragic accident”.

“The circumstances of how the plane came to crash is currently under investigation,” he added.

“These people had come over on holiday to visit Australia, they were in one of the most beautiful parts of the world and for this to happen at a place like that is nothing more than just tragic.”

ATSB investigators from Canberra were working on how to salvage the plane from the riverbed after recovering victims’ bodies on Sunday.

“The sequence of events leading up to the accident are not yet understood, however following the impact with the water, the aircraft is reported to have sunk rapidly,” the authority said.

Additional reporting by PA