The Stowe-base contractor is now looking forward to another record-breaking year with strong forward orders and sales predicted to top £625m.

Chief executive Mike Kempley said: “While our head office complex has never been quieter, our work winning teams, based largely from home, have rarely been more active or successful than during the past twelve months.

“The result of this collective endeavor is that at the time of signing off the results, our teams had already secured a record forward order book of £1.03bn. This includes £590m of secured workload for 2021.”

Kempley said: “Together, our teams ensured that only a handful of our people appeared to contract the virus through the workplace, and we can be extremely grateful that throughout 2020, no employees were admitted to hospital as a result of Covid-19.”

While added costs impacted pre-tax profit which dipped to £8.6m from £10.2m previously, net profit margin achieved a higher level than first expected of 1.5%, which Kemply described as an outstanding result.

Much of the jump in orders came from increased activity in the industrial logistics sector, a primary market for the business, supporting both the core civil engineering and building capabilities.

The firm’s HS2 operating division set up last year under Sector MD Simon Hyams, achieved £47m of sales in the year on enabling works.

Buckingham Group has now secured significant future opportunities worth £157m on the national infrastructure project.

The firm’s civil engineering division also recently secured Swindon Distributor Road and M1-A6 Link Road schemes.

Looking ahead Kempley said: “Vitally, by remaining customer-facing, nurturing our valuable staff resource and carefully managing the inflationary pressures that are impacting the industry, there is every reason to believe that profit margins will return to the target level of 3% or better in the years ahead.‘’