A joint delegation from the print, paper and packaging industries has attended an industry roundtable at 10 Downing Street, to set out the industries’ contribution to the economic and social progress of the UK, while highlighting the structural and strategic support that could spur new growth.
The delegates met with a senior special advisor to the Prime Minister, who heard from participants on a range of areas where progress could be made to encourage growth in the print, paper and packaging industries, and how they in turn could assist UK economic expansion. These included energy costs and infrastructure development, material costs, recycling and the circular economy, technology innovation, export opportunities, the perception of print and paper, and the promotion of print’s positive contribution to culture and society.
The event follows on from an initial meeting at No 10 in April 2023 at which IPIA chair Charles Rogers made an initial case for the industry and his subsequent attendance at a business leaders’ reception at the beginning of June, hosted by the deputy prime minister Oliver Dowden. Both meetings were also attended by Puneet Gupta, joint CEO of PG Paper Company, who also formed part of the most recent delegation, along with commercial director Lyndsey James-Williams.
Mr Rogers commented on the most recent meeting, ‘Our presentation was clear, we are a huge part of the UK economy, and play a key role in every other industry and the health of our society – assist us and we will remain resilient and a key manufacturing asset for UK PLC.
‘This was an important day for our collective industries. The input was simply remarkable, and there was consistent messaging from both global corporations and SMEs.’
In addition to Mr Rogers, the delegation included of Brendan Perring of the IPIA, Lance Hill of Eight Days a Week Print Solutions, Anthony Rowell, managing director of Tradeprint, Jane Rixon of HP, Marine Kerivel-Brown of Duplo International, Sarah Kilcoyne-Guilliam of Kingsbury Press/Bluetree Group, Simon Cooper, managing director of Solopress, and Mike Hughes managing director at Latcham.