The sixth annual Constructing Excellence National Awards took place on the 30th November in London. The awards were attended by over 450 people from across the UK, celebrating achievements in the built environment sector.

CEW Awards winners went on to represent Wales at the national CE Awards. Throughout the year similar regional Constructing Excellence Awards have been held across the country and the winners from the East Midlands, London and South East, North East, North West, South West, Wales, West Midlands and Yorkshire and Humber then went forward to the short list for the national awards.

Torfaen County Borough Council won the Client of the year national award. Its novel approach to procurement, best practice, community involvement and collaborative working impressed the judges. In 2005 it formalised a single contractor framework agreement with Kier Construction, based in Newport and Kier’s design team partners (architects Powell Dobson and engineering consultants Bingham Hall and Hoare Lea).

The framework has delivered a total of 12 educational and community regeneration projects worth nearly £80 million. All projects were delivered within budget and schedule, and all showed improved customer satisfaction. The council defined a number of performance measures, including reportable accident rates, client satisfaction and number of local workers employed. Over the seven-year period, the framework team improved and exceeded all KPI requirements.


Blaenavon Community campus scored 10/10 in client satisfaction.