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John McDonough, chief executive of Carillion, confirmed that most of the senior team at Alfred McAlpine would leave, after the 拢554m takeover was sealed on Tuesday.

Those departing include all four of the top management: Ian Grice, the chief executive; Mark Greenwood, the finance director; Matt Swan, the managing director; and Chris Lea, the company secretary.

Despite repeated assurances that Carillion had bought McAlpine for its people, McDonough, said: 鈥淔allout is inevitable, but we鈥檙e talking about handfuls of people at a senior level. Most people in middle management and workers will be unaffected.鈥�

McDonough is anxious to avoid some of the problems that arose after Carillion鈥檚 拢313m acquisition of Mowlem in 2006, when 300 people left and problem contracts forced a 拢90m write-down.

McDonough said the number of redundancies had not been finalised but would be 鈥渞elatively few 鈥� not hundreds and hundreds鈥�. He confirmed that there would be a 鈥渞ationalisation of offices鈥� in the enlarged group, though details of closures were still under discussion.

McDonough said Carillion had more than 700 vacancies, and would seek to address this 鈥渂arrier to growth鈥� by retaining as many McAlpine staff as possible. He added that he and his senior team planned to visit every McAlpine office and project in the UK to discuss opportunities with workers.

McDonough emphasised that much of the six months of talks before the McAlpine takeover had been taken up with due diligence to avoid another post-merger write-down.

He said: 鈥淎lthough I鈥檇 still look back at the Mowlem deal and say it was a fantastic acquisition, there were, during the due diligence process, cock-ups with two major projects [the Dublin Port Tunnel and 拢95m Exeter Schools PFI].

鈥淚s there the likelihood of the same with McAlpine? I think the answer is no. This time around there has been a due diligence process of six weeks, with a lot of people going through the books.鈥�

He added: 鈥淢cAlpine has done a very good job over the past few years of managing its risk well. We don鈥檛 have a 拢4bn tunnel going through Dublin with a Japanese tunneller and a Spanish M&E provider.

鈥淥bviously there is some risk, as its construction, but I would say there鈥檚 nothing at a project level that could materially affect the enlarged group, which was the case with Mowlem.鈥�

Fallout is inevitable, but we鈥檙e talking about handfuls of senior people. Most will be unaffected

Once the integration of McAlpine is under way, McDonough will be in charge of a 拢5.3bn turnover contractor, the second biggest in the UK after Balfour Beatty.

He said his next steps would be to expand its services business 10% a year, double its turnover in the Middle East to 拢600m within three years and develop its Canadian construction business through acquisition.

He said that, although this was unlikely to involve another big takeover, 鈥渢omorrow is another day鈥�.

He added that he was keen to make bolt-on acquisitions.

One part of the business where McDonough is hoping to strengthen staff numbers is in Dubai.

He plans to double turnover in the Middle East over the next three years but to do that he needs to increase his number of experienced project managers dramatically.

About 30 project directors moved to the region last year and he is hoping for a similar number this year.

McDonough said that although the precise structure of the post-acquisition group had yet to be finalised, McAlpine's operations would be placed within Carillion鈥檚 four business streams of business services, building, infrastructure and international work.

This structure was put in place just before Christmas to support the company's growth.