A few weeks ago a contact of mine happened to mention the fact that East Riding Council owned their own printing plant at Woodmansey near Beverley.

This snippet of information surprised me. We all receive the quarterly highly informative ERYC magazine ‘Your East Riding’ plus various leaflets and council tax demands but surely a quarterly magazine and some leaflets cannot warrant a County Council running a printing plant?

To find out if I was being spun a yarn I submitted a ‘Freedom of Information’ request to ERYC.

Today I received confirmation that East Yorkshire council does indeed run its own printing plant which employs 19 print workers and designers at an annual cost of £1,297,610. This figure includes the production of all Council printing and design (including printing newsletters and leaflets, distribution of newsletters and leaflets). They have not stated whether or not the running costs are offset by external work which the council.

I am a champion of openness and communication in public bodies and think it is important the council communicates with their residents effectively. But…. their own printing plant with 19 staff costing £1,297,610 a year?

Let’s not forget that ERYC is desperate to save the £90,000 a year running costs of Burnby Hall.