The project will be run by Intergraf and Uni Europa Graphical with funding from the European Commission. It begins in Brussels on 22 January, with a meeting of all the national trade unions and trade bodies.

These will be followed up over the year with two national workshops for each of the seven countries involved, which will feed back into a final meeting expected to be in September.

In particular, the project will look at the web-offset and gravure industries, which are particularly struggling from overcapacity at the moment.

Steve Sibbald, national officer at Unite, told PrintWeek: "Unlike David Cameron, we are embracing our fellow Europeans and hope to come to some agreement on how to deal with the contraction of the industry.

"We hope to reach conclusions on how best to do this and maybe even policies or agreements on how to deal with restructuring.

"From the trade unions' point of view, we agree that restructuring has to take place. But the question is, how do we go about achieving that in a socially responsible way. That means payment to employees and re-training."