A boardroom row at Capital & Regional, one of Britain’s biggest shopping centre and retail park-owners, could force out the company’s chief executive.

Martin Barber, a veteran of the commercial property industry, is understood to be close to agreeing a severance package that would mean he walks out of the business that he co-founded nearly thirty years ago.

The company revealed in December that Mr Barber planned to retire in August 2009 after the collapse in the company’s share price.

However, it is understood that he could be ousted in a matter of weeks after a dispute with Tom Chandos, the chairman, and the rest of the board.

Spencer Stuart, the headhunters, are believed to have been asked to start the search for a successor. One possible external target could be Hugh Scott-Barrett, the former finance director of ABN Amro.

PY Gerbeau, the head of Capital & Regional’s leisure division and the former managing director of the Millennium Dome, now the O2 arena and complex, has been touted as a potential internal candidate.

An announcement regarding Mr Barber’s future could come tomorrow alongside Capital & Regional’s full-year results. A company spokesman refused to comment.

Shares in the company have fallen by 70 per cent since spring last year as it grapples with the slowdown in the commercial property market. Falling property values have left the group vulnerable to breaching its loan-to-value debt covenants. The downturn has also left Capital & Regional facing the prospect of paying investors for missing private equity-style performance targets.

Under an unusual structure, Capital & Regional’s assets are held in three investment funds that are backed by a range of institutions. The company is best known for its Mall chain of shopping centres in cities and towns such as Norwich, Middlesbrough, Romford and Southampton.

As Capital & Regional struggles to stabilise its fragile balance sheet, it is understood to have approached a select group of property investors with a view to selling some of its shopping centres and leisure attractions.

There is also speculation that the quoted company could become a takeover target for a private equity investor.

— The downturn in the commercial property sector appears yet to feed through to estate agents and property consultants.

Staff at Savills are expected to share a record £150 million bonus pool, when the property consultancy announces full-year results this week, overshadowing last year’s bonus pool of £125 million. Analysts have pencilled in underlying group profits of about £86 million, up from £75 million last year, after the company issued a bullish trading update in January.

Aubrey Adams, chief executive for the past 20 years, will step down in May, handing over to Jeremy Helsby. Savills is expected to make a more guarded statement on the outlook for commercial property in 2008.

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