Buyer Rhomberg Sersa Rail Group of Austria will pay £6m for the businesses.

But after cash transferred with the business units is taken into account the deal is cash neutral and amounts to a giveaway.

The businesses being sold employ around 600 staff and generated around £80m turnover in 2013 with reported losses of £8m.

They were valued on Balfour’s books as gross assets worth £36m and once sold will be written down as a £25m book loss.

Balfour Beatty aims to sell all of its mainland European rail operations and is in discussions with potential buyers for the remaining parts of the German and Italian rail businesses.

Recently Balfour completed the disposal of the German Railroad Tuning Business for £1m.