Lord Black of Brentwood, who hosted the event, quipped: “Such foresight by The Printing Charity! Who could possibly have foretold that we’d all be here in Westminster on such a momentous day, with one Prime Minister departing and another starting work. Apparently.”
“A great experiment is about to take part which will either be a huge success or a disaster. Either way, you can tell your grandchildren you were here.”
Lord Black is an executive director of the Telegraph Media Group, where Boris Johnson has been a columnist for many years.
Lord Black said that back in 2004, the predecessor of the current awards scheme made just four grants. Now, after a decade of Print Futures, the number of winners is approaching 100, with 93 young people receiving awards out of 248 applicants.
“Perhaps next year we might get to a century. We had a large number of applications from the north, and so many were from women – 2:1 – I think the outgoing PM would heartily approve,” Lord Black said.
Print Futures winners came from the print, packaging, graphic design, publishing and journalism, and received grants of up to £1,500 to support training and development.
Multiple trainees from a number of printing businesses racked up awards, including Graphic Packaging International, Instantprint, ProCo, Communisis and DC Thomson.
Communisis chief executive Andy Blundell said: “It’s great to see the optimism and smiles in the room. The sheer optimism of youth and people getting into the business, and being touched by the recognition. It’s really positive.”
Connor Daniels, an apprentice customer service representative from MBM Print SCS in Glasgow, praised the organisation of the scheme. He said: “It’s been very well-designed and I understood what was required. I’m planning to use my grant to take two courses that will help me achieve my aspirations to move into sales in the future.”
Neil Lovell, chief executive of The Printing Charity, thanked the Print Futures judges, which included PrintWeek editor and publisher Darryl Danielli, and sponsors Saxoprint, the Book Trade Charity, Unite the Union, and Baddeley Brothers which printed this year’s certificates.
“The Awards have grown exponentially. Planning starts in November for 2020, please pass the message on!” he said.
