BP has faced questions over whether it cut the budget for its Texas City refinery by 25 per cent, in the year of the fatal explosion in the US city that killed 15 people and injured 500.

Don Parus, then Texas City plant manager, told an inquiry conducted after the blast that Patrick Gower, BP's regional vice-president for refining in the US, had cut his budget by 25 per cent. BP denies the figure, although in response to FT inquiries it has admitted to a reduction in its capital expenditure budget in the year 2004/5.