Paper is weight off court's shoulders

Under the changes, printed documents will only be used when required to be tendered in court. Spigelman told the Australian Financial Review that: "This is designed to reduce the number of physical documents in the process but also the number of times things are converted from one form to another. The costs of discovery are not sustainable in the longer term."

These developments are not new, according to one industry insider, who said that the move towards electronic documents has been coming for some time. "The outcomes are very undetermined at the moment. I don't think it will cause the loss of jobs in legal inplants," he said.

Legal documents are not the only print to make the switch into electronic form. Annual reports could be on their way out, as 80 per cent on investors told the Australasian Investor Relations Association that they were content to read company information online and did not require a paper copy.

AIRA chief Ian Matheson told the Australian Financial Review that: "The annual report in the post box once a year is no longer the key communication point between listed companies and their retail shareholders."

Printing Industries is currently conducting a rearguard action against any Federal legislation to make printed annual reports an 'opt-in' rather than an 'opt-out' option for shareholders. Annual Reports



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