Samantha Morrison says she is “not the worrying type”. That natural insouciance means she wastes little time ruminating about what could happen to her machining business should the world plunge into a global recession.

“We have a good order book stretching all the way towards the end of next year,” says Ms Morrison, the 34-year-old managing director and owner of Portchester Engineering, an engineering subcontractor based in Portchester, Hampshire. “Perhaps we are one of the lucky ones.”