Quebecor World has entered a 30-day consultation period with the GPMU after it announced plans to cut 10% of staff, or 90 jobs, at Corby. It said the cuts were necessary to counteract overcapacity, intense competition from Europe and reduced demand.

Corby operations managing director Andrew Parker said: "Customers are trying to cut their costs by reducing paper size and volume. It is vital that we cut our costs to remain competitive."

Cradley has issued an HR1 notice and is in talks with the GPMU about redundancies after it warned of a pre-tax loss of 850,000 for the six months to 31 December. Joint managing director Chris Jordan said the as-yet unknown number of cuts were part of an on-going programme to tackle tough market conditions: "Were looking at cutting from unprofitable areas like manual planning." But he insisted the fundamentals of the business were "sound".

Cooper Clegg has also taken action to cut its cost base after reporting its first pre-tax loss for several years. Staff at the Tewkesbury web offset printer voted 2:1 in favour of its proposals, which included pay cuts of up to 15% after it introduced a standard 36-hour working week. It has avoided redundancies.

Cooper Clegg made a 554,000 loss on static sales of 36m for the year to 31 March 2001. "We did more work for the same money," said managing director Ian Cooper. The firms export sales fell to under 500,000 compared to over 1m in the previous year and 8.2m four years earlier.

Cooper said he was "positive" about the firms future, but repeated his belief that the web offset sector was in its worst shape in 30 years.

Wyndeham has decided not to pay a dividend after deferring its decision when it announced interim results last November. Chief executive Bryan Bedson said: "We left it just in case things got better and they havent. But in fairness they havent got any worse either its just a case of battening down the hatches."

Story by John Davies and Gordon Carson