The firm romped away with pole position in the annual contracts league after securing just over £3bn worth of projects in 2018, well ahead of second placed Wates on around £2bn and Morgan Sindall in third position with £1.7bn.

It is the third time in five years that Kier has topped the league of project wins, according to data collected by information specialist Glenigan.

The top 10 firms saw their share of total new orders secured by the 100 leading contractors slip to 40% in 2018 from 43% in 2017.

Overall the total haul of work shared by these 100 firms fell 20% to £37bn compared with 2017.

Among the big fallers from previous years, Balfour Beatty and Laing O’Rourke dropped out of the top 10, while Tarmac, Bouygues and Lendlease joined the top players for the first time.

Based on civil engineering workloads alone Tarmac ranked top followed by Costain and then Kier.

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Click for full 100 clients league

Among the big contract awards in December, Morgan Sindall and Volker rounded off the year with a share of £196m Barking Riverside project.

Mace landed the £130m Stansted Airport Arrivals building. Henry secured the £80m next phase of the Brighton Barracks development and Graham was confirmed main contractor on a £70m student accommodation scheme at the University of Brighton.