Printers hit by loss of rail tickets contract

STAFF at a Hull printing firm face an uncertain future after the company lost a £20m contract to supply the UK's train tickets.

BemroseBooth has been producing the tickets for the Association of Train Operating Companies for 15 years.

However the ticketing contract has now been awarded to European firm Paragon.

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General manager at BemroseBooth Simon Jones said a decision would be finalised by the end of the March.

He declined to say how many of the company's 188 staff were affected.

Rather than redundancies, staff may be offered a transfer to Paragon's sites in Sunderland and Castleford. He added: "Paragon might say they want to take on all these people. There's so much water to go under the bridge yet."

He said there had been redundancies in the business already, not to do with the contract, but because of restructuring and cost-saving.

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Paragon Group employs 1,100 people across 14 locations in Europe and has revenues of 160m euros (140m).

The Association of Train Operating Companies said: "Following a competitive process run strictly under European Union procurement rules, the ticketing contract has been awarded to Paragon.

"We review major contracts such as those for ticket supply as a matter of course to make sure we are able to provide rail passengers with the best value for money.

"Whilst any redundancies are extremely regrettable, we are obliged to follow the EU process, which does open up the opportunity to firms in other EU countries."