Wandsworth Council's General Purposes Committee has agreed to review its current practices for printing council papers, aiming to reduce costs while ensuring councillors have access to the information they need. The move is expected to contribute to a previously approved budget reduction of £25,000.

The committee discussed a report on the future approach to printing council and committee papers, acknowledging that while many members prefer paper copies for practical reasons, there are opportunities to reduce unnecessary printing. The current annual cost for printing council papers through the primary supplier is approximately £17,000, with overall costs, including in-house printing, postage, and handling, estimated to exceed £25,000 per annum.

The existing opt-out/opt-in system for printed agenda packs will be maintained, allowing councillors to continue receiving paper copies if they wish. However, the council will explore options to limit the printing of large appendices and spare public gallery copies. Large appendices will not be printed unless they are required for approval or essential to the debate.

To facilitate a move towards a more digital model, the council will enhance its digital offer for members by making modern.gov, the Council's committee management system more useful and attractive. This includes providing practical training on modern.gov, support with annotation and navigation, clear guidance on using Council-issued devices in meetings, and responsive help for any difficulties members experience. The council has stated it will be more than happy to arrange as many training sessions as needed for members in terms of how to access those papers.

Despite the push for digital access, some councillors have raised concerns. Councillor Rex Osborne highlighted the added burden of carrying devices to meetings, stating, if you're coming to a meeting here at the town hall from work, then the idea that in addition to whatever equipment you might have to have at work, you also have to have some sort of a device which can pick up council papers and bring that from work with you to the meeting is adding to the things you've got to organise, the weight you've got to carry, and all the possible accidents you might have, and so on. Councillor Peter Graham echoed these sentiments, noting that for the same reason that we do still print books, papers that are printed are more useful for most of us at least.

The success of these cost-reduction efforts will be measured by whether savings can be achieved within the agreed budget assumption. The report states, If savings cannot be achieved within the agreed budget assumption, further consideration may be required.

The meeting where these decisions were made took place on Monday, 20 July 2026. The report on the future approach to printing council and committee papers was discussed, and the committee agreed to preserve the existing opt-out/opt-in approach for printed agenda packs. The financial implications were noted, with a budget reduction of £25,000 having been previously approved based on a move towards a more digital model. The report itself was dated 8th July 2026, indicating that the discussion and potential implementation would follow this meeting.

For further details, the agenda for the General Purposes Committee on 20 July 2026 can be found here. The public reports pack for the same meeting is available here.