The Public Affairs Awards 2014, hosted by the PRCA, Zetter’s Political Services and GovKnow, took place on Tuesday 9th December in the Thames Room of the Park Plaza Riverbank, where 275 public affairs practitioners gathered to celebrate the very best of the year’s public affairs activities.
The inaugural awards focused on Westminster, yet also included the devolved Parliament and Assemblies and reached across the channel to Brussels. The 35-strong judging panel, including PubAffairs Founder and Director Phil Murphy, evaluated a large number of entries for a total of 15 categories.
The night’s big winners were R3, the Association of Business Recovery Professionals, which won In-house Team of the Year; and Fishburn, winning the Consultancy of the Year Award. Judges said that R3 ‘enjoyed a highly successful year’ by bringing the issue to the attention of stakeholders with ‘significant wins’ achieved through their ‘integrated approach’. Fishburn was praised as an ‘outstanding consultancy’ with ‘excellent growth in income’ and a ‘high success rate for winning new business’. The ceremony culminated with the Outstanding Contribution Award, handed out to Gill Morris, Chief Executive of Connect Communications, which was her second such award in just one week.
Speaking at the event, PRCA Director General Francis Ingham, said: “This has been a superb year to launch the Public Affairs Awards – the calibre of entries has been incredibly impressive. The public affairs industry is clearly in rude health – and long may it continue.”
Lionel Zetter, PRCA Public Affairs Group Chairman, said: "The volume and quality of the entries clearly demonstrated the great public affairs work which is being undertaken throughout the UK - and in Brussels. This made the judging process harder, but I look forward to the task of choosing the winners being even tougher next year.”
See below for a list of all 2014 winners:
- In-house Professional of the Year: Tim Alderslade, Senior Public Affairs & PR Manager, Airport Operators Association
- Consultant of the Year: Rachel Barrett, Senior Consultant, Fishburn
- Consultancy Campaign of the Year: Insight Public Affairs, “Securing Camden’s Future: Ditch the HS2 Link”
- Public Sector Campaign of the Year: Insight Public Affairs with Camden Town Unlimited, “Keeping Business Alive in Camden: Scrapping the HS2 Link”
- Corporate Campaign of the Year: Pimlico Plumbers with Connect Communications, “Giving Opportunity to the Next Generation of Apprentices”
- Voluntary Sector Campaign of the Year: MS Society, “Treat Me Right”
- Trade Body Campaign of the Year: ukactive, "Turning the Tide of Inactivity"
- Best In-house Agency Collaboration: Freshwater and the League Against Cruel Sports, "#Whatthefox?”
- Best Campaign in Scotland: Pagoda Public Relations with McCarthy and Stone, “Improving housing choices for older Scots”
- Best Campaign in Wales: Positif Politics, “cymru.wales: Domains for Wales”
- Best Campaign in Northern Ireland: Aiken PR, “Opt for Life”
- Best Campaign in the EU: Cancer Research UK, "Tobacco Products Directive"
- Outstanding Contribution Award: Gill Morris, Chief Executive, Connect Communications