CONSTRUCTION firm Surgo has revealed it has already won 70% of the contracts it needs to break even this financial year, despite being less than halfway through it and starting the year on the back of a £10m dip in turnover.

Contracts worth £12m for work on four North East schools are among a string of recent wins that have given the Newcastle firm confidence that it will remain in the black in the year ahead, despite its latest annual report showing further signs of the ongoing tough climate in the building sector.

In the year to the end of August 2011, the company’s annual turnover fell from £36.2m to £25.4m, as pretax profit slipped from £5.5m to £2.7m.

However, according to director Jeff Alexander, orders and enquiries at the firm have been extremely buoyant in recent weeks, with over two-thirds of the contracts needed to maintain its strong financial footing having already been signed and sealed.

Looking forward to what many analysts are predicting to be a tougher year than 2011 for construction firms, Alexander said: “We have maintained a healthy profit that was above what we were expecting and we were pleased with the jobs we took on last year.

“This is going to be a tough year but because we are financially strong we won’t need to use our overdraft facility and we are already well ahead of our expectations for 2012.”