Balfour Beatty tops CJ50 Contracts League for 2008

Construction titan Balfour Beatty has topped the annual CJ50 contracts league table for a record fourth time, having won £3.3bn worth of work in 2008. It ran away with over £800m more than Laing O'Rourke, its nearest rival, and like the CJ50 itself only narrowly missed out on a record year.

• View the annual CJ50 contracts league table
• View the December CJ50 contracts league table

The firm recorded strong overall growth in 2008, driven by its performance in the public and infrastructure sectors. In fact, its iron grip on the top spot was further strengthened by the Government's plan to bring forward public spending in order to kickstart the economy.

With Laing O'Rourke hot on its heels in November Balfour Beatty pulled away having won the £365m dualling project on the A46 between Newark and Widmerpool in December.

Despite the well-publicised economic worries, last year wasn't just a good year for Balfour Beatty, it proved to be positive for all contractors making up the CJ50. Total new orders did not hit the heights of 2007 - when £32.7bn worth of work was let - but it was still the second best year in CJ50 history, just £2bn short at £30.7bn.

In a year when Building Schools for the Future schemes finally started to come through, other public non-housing work accounted for 30% of the 2008 total, up from 24% in 2007. Infrastructure was also up, accounting for a quarter of work let in 2008, compared to 21% in both 2006 and 2007.

Social housing remained steady at 15% in 2008, a slight drop from 17% in 2007 but evidence that the Decent Homes programme continues to provide a drip-feed of work. Perhaps unsurprisingly, private commercial orders were down 7% on the previous year, dropping back to the same share as 2006 at 28% and private industrial orders fell 1% to 2%.

Coming in second to the UK's largest contractor, Laing O'Rourke maintained its number two status. Among the £2.5bn-worth of work from 43 contracts it scooped in 2008 was a £400m deal for the first phase of a new port at London Gateway, a £200m contract for the commercial element of the redevelopment of Bury town centre and the £225m Pembury Hospital scheme as part of the John Laing Consortium.

Kier switched places with Bam Construct, sneaking past with £2bn-worth of work in 2008 to Bam's £1.9bn. It won more work than any other contractor in the Midlands and drove Bam close in the race to top the public sector work table.

The highest mover year-on-year was Costain, who shot up 18 places to fifth with nearly £1.8bn worth of work. Over half of its work was won in a bumper June in which it picked up an extension of a utilities contract for Southern Water worth £800m.

Carillion also made progress in 2008, moving up four places to sixth, while Morgan Sindall dropped a place to seventh.

Sir Robert McAlpine moved up three places to eighth, with its £400m role as part of Team Stadium for 2012 by far its biggest win.

It was closely followed by Rok which won 259 contracts worth £1.2bn. The majority of its work was unsurprisingly in the social housing arena, a sector which it topped in 2008, taking double the work of its nearest rival, Apollo.

Completing the top ten was Skanska, which dropped three places with £954m-worth of work.

High risers in 2008 include Fitzpatrick, which moved up seven places to 23 and topped the private industrial sector table, and Thomas Vale, which shot up nine places to 32.

Meanwhile, the years biggest losers were Taylor Woodrow, which fell 11 places to 30 and won just £232m-worth of work compared to £532m in 2007, Renew, whose work won also more than halved, and FM Conway, which plummeted 17 places to 48 with just £59m-worth or work.