News

Back in March, when Alistair Darling delivered his first Budget, it was roundly criticised for being dull and predictable. By contrast, Monday's pre-Budget speech was anything but. VAT cuts, increases in income tax and borrowing, borrowing and yet more borrowing dominated the plans with more real measures being announced than in the Budget itself.

The chancellor set out proposals for small businesses, including the retraction of the mislaid empty property relief scheme.

But, for the UK print industry, the cuts in VAT and increase in benefits will do not sufficiently boost consumer spending power to stimulate the economy, while the delay of the 1p increase in corporation tax will do little to help bottom lines already stretched by rising raw material costs and falling output costs.

However, there may be something of a silver lining, albeit a thin one, as one effect of increased borrowing will be a further decline in the value of the pound with the very real prospect that we could next year reach parity with the euro.

While this is not in some respects a positive thing for the industry, as many raw materials are sourced in euros, it does make UK print much cheaper for foreign buyers. At the time of writing, Bauer was in the process of finalising its printing contracts following the Emap acquisition. It will be interesting to see if its anticipated shift to Europe for many of the titles will be scaled back and whether savvy UK printers will start to win work from overseas.

Magazine production is just one of the areas that could boost print exports, which have diminished significantly over the past few years, providing access to the lucrative markets of Northern European and beyond.

William Mitting is news editor of PrintWeek.