Morgan Sindall this week wrote off £8m from the value of contracts at regional contracting business Bluestone.
Morgan Sindall said the division would post a £4m loss rather than the £4m profit that the City had expected. Finance director John Bishop said the decision had been made after a review of the business and described it at as a one-off.

Bishop said three offices were to blame for the losses, and 15 contracts had contributed 90% of the write-down. “There was a review of contracts and individual offices’ workloads, which saw an £8m write-down.

“There are no black-hole contracts, just a more consistent and prudent approach to the value of contracts. Some of our profit centres were not as prudent as they could have been.”