These recorded a £73.6m loss, but its remaining businesses – Portakabin, Poratsilo and Portastor – reported a £36.7m profit over the same period. With other income this gave a £35m pre-tax loss over the results for the 18 months covered by Shepherd’s changed reporting date.

The group sold Shepherd Construction, Shepherd Engineering Services and Shepherd FM to Wates Group in October 2015 and offloaded Shepherd Homes to Galliford Try’s Linden Homes in May last year.

Shepherd said it had wanted to reduce its exposure to higher risk businesses and concentrate on its other operations.

The company said the profit recorded by these showed “a good indication of the future profit performance of the group unfettered by the higher risk activities of the former built environment businesses”.

Chairman David Williams said: “The past is reflected in the losses arising out of a small number of very challenging legacy contracts experienced by the divested contracting businesses.

“Our efforts are now very clearly focused on Shepherd Group’s future which is represented by the continuing success and profitability of Portakabin.”

Shepherd still has its former construction division’s Colindale contract to complete, a £64m regeneration scheme started in 2013.

It also has continuing liability for up to 12 years for completed Shepherd Construction projects. The company said management and resources were in place to deal with both.