A final $3.4 million grant to peak industry body, Printing Industries, approved in December, takes Federal Government print industry funding to an unprecedented $11 million since 2012 and fuels an ambitious industry transformation scheme. It coincides with the launch of a blueprint policy document, Priorities for Print, targeting Federal MPs and Senators, calling for action to help printing towards a sustainable future.
Bill Healey, CEO, Printing Industries, formally kicked off Future Print this week, the largest industry transformation scheme since the original Print21 action agenda 14 years ago. Aimed at supporting Association members and the industry at large in responding to the challenges of the digital economy, it is a multi-faceted strategy focusing on training, business assessments and productivity improvements.
“This is the start of a journey. It is not a single project but the beginning of an ongoing transformation of the industry that will build on and enhance the original Print21 Action Scheme,” said Healey. “It is now up to the industry members to take advantage of the infrastructure we’ve put in place to assist them to innovate.”
The ambitious scheme focuses on the majority of printing business in the industry with turnover under $1.5 million. It engages large printing firms in the establishment of cooperative precincts and groupings.
One of the initial goals is to assess 350 such SME print businesses over two years, dividing them into three groups:
- viable businesses that want to make change but lack the internal knowledge and expertise to make changes
- well-functioning firms capable of adapting to the new economy without any assistance, and
- non-viable businesses with owners wanting to exit.
“The goal is to assist and encourage dynamic sustainable firms within the printing industry. It’s not about trying to resurrect unsustainable business models. The resources are there to help businesses adapt to the new world and where necessary to help with succession plans and exit strategies,” said Healey.
The most recent funding, created the National Workforce Development Fund, which aims to establish dynamic sustainable firms by helping them to evaluate current and future capabilities, provide workshops and self-assessment tools, deliver the skilled workers, foster innovation, improve capital utilisation and underpin productivity improvements.
The NWDF will provide for advisers to go into businesses, host workshops for compatible businesses and develop self-assessment tools. The aim is to have the initial round of business assessments underway shortly after April this year.
It will also allocate $1.1 million to fund 500 training places in areas such as competitive systems and processes, management and leadership, sales and marketing and business strategy. It will encourage strategic mergers, the development of new products and service and the identification of new markets for printing.
Healey recognises and dismisses concerns amongst some members about the involvement of unions, specifically the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) in the innovation project. He made the point that unions have always been involved in training for the past 25 years and that protocols are in place to effectively manage the partnership.
“This is not about increasing union involvement in the industry. I’m very comfortable about the process and you must remember that most of the funding came under the previous Labor Government,” he said. “Many of our members have already been engaged in the early stages of some of these projects, such as the successful Apprenticeship Mentoring project that finishes in June. I see it as a collaborative way to build a sustainable industry."
Priorities for Print
As part of Healey’s vision to raise the industry’s profile with the Federal Government and Opposition, he announced the publication of Priorities for Print, a 32-page document sent to all members of Federal Parliament. Emphasising the importance of printing to the Australian economy, it identifies 14 areas of importance to the industry and issues relevant Calls for Action.
In addition to broad recommendations to ensure a strong Australia economy, it focuses on issues of particular importance to printers, such as fair and transparent Government print procurement, ensuring efficient and effective postal services, preventing phoenix business activity and promoting the environmental credentials of print.
Government printing accounts for 10 percent of total print spending in Australia. Priorities for Print attacks recent cuts to public sector printing budgets based on the substitution of online communication. It calls the cuts misplaced and detrimental to the many elderly and socially disadvantaged who do not have access to online services. In its Call for Action it demands the introduction of preferential purchasing from Australian print businesses rather than from offshore. It also seeks to separate print management and print production services and ensure simplicity, transparency and fairness in public print procurement.
The increase in the amount of commercial printing undertaken by Australia Post comes in for a serve. PostConnect is on its way to becoming one of the largest DM printers in the industry producing Coles FlyBuys print among others. The Call for Action focuses on preventing Australia Post from expanding its involvement in the production and distribution of bulk mail products and services. It also calls for the reintroduction of the ACCC approval process for price rises of bulk mail.
Priorities for Print identifies some $25 million in payments through the Fair Entitlement Guarantee Scheme to retrenched staff from printing companies that went broke in 2013. It is concerned that some of these companies subsequently return as phoenix businesses with an unfair trading advantage. The Call for Action is to enforce more vigorously laws relating to insolvent trading and fraudulent director activity leading to business failures.
A more robust defence of the printing industry’s environmental credentials is called for to make the community aware of the actual environmental footprint of digital-based communication as compared to print. A Call for Action wants the federal government to acknowledge and promote the sustainability of paper and print.
A total of 1800 copies of the Priorities for Print were published and distributed, ensuring blanket coverage of all Federal politicians. According to Bill Healey, it is one of a number of steps underway to raise the industry’s profile in Canberra.