Worley chief executive Chris Ashton says he is fighting to protect the integrity of the global engineering group, meeting with investors and analysts in an attempt to stop a slide in the company’s share price after it was hit with corruption allegations.

Worley has denied the allegations made by the Ecuadorian government as part of a long-running dispute over payments the engineering group alleges it is owed for work on energy projects between 2011 and 2017.