Collective total turnover edged up to £4.706bn, even surpassing the pre-Covid figure of £4.451bn, although some of the increase was down to contract sums increasing due to inflation.

The top M&E rankings remained stable year-on-year with the top three – NG Bailey, Imtech and TClarke – maintaining their dominance. Crown House edged up the rankings to fourth while Michael J Lonsdale grew strongly last year to enter the top 10 firms.

(The Top 30 is compiled for trade body BESA by Gokhan Hassan, Managing Director at Chartered QS practice, GHCS)

Building Engineering Services Association chief executive David Frise said: “The industry continues to adapt to the challenges of skills shortages, net zero and the Building Safety Act allowing good companies to differentiate themselves, through innovation and evidence of competence.”

Workloads are reported to be strong despite the wider economic slowdown with firms seeing a return of bigger projects.

Danny Bavington, Business Unit Director South at SES Engineering Services, said: “There had been a definite increase in large schemes in the last 12 to 18 months, which seems to have caused some saturation in the market.

“While healthcare seems to have gone a little quiet with the delay of the New Hospitals Programme, life sciences seems to have really picked up.

“There are a large number of projects going ahead in the future laboratory fitout sector and it seems like a few of these have been switched from commercial office schemes, which leads us to think that it’ll push a bit of a race to market, certainly in Central London.”

On the other hand, other sectors such as residential and hotels still retain a level of uncertainty.

Cathal McMullan, managing director at Kane Group, said: “There is still a delay in decision-making due to stakeholders re-assessing their requirements and seeking further cost reductions in schemes.”

As well as the impact of higher mortgage rates the introduction of second staircases within high-rise buildings is also causing concern as it impacts already on schemes in London.