The call for entries for the CEW Awards 2017 went live this week. Download the forms and find out why you should celebrate best practice.
This week sees Constructing Excellence in Wales call for entries to the eleventh running of its awards celebrating the success of Welsh construction. The launch of the 2017 CEW Awards comes a week after Lesley Griffiths AM, Cabinet Secretary for Environment and Rural Affairs, attended an event at the Senedd showcasing the 2016 winners.
The Senedd event, which was jointly hosted by CEW, ICE Wales and CECA Wales promoted the central role construction has in creating a sustainable built environment and supporting the aims of the Future Generations Act.
The awards themselves encourage best practice across the construction industry in Wales and recognise the variety of activities, skills and areas of expertise that make up the construction sector. The winners are exemplars and demonstrate what the building and civil engineering industry are doing right in Wales, helping to deliver our policies and programmes.
Because right across Welsh construction, not just the award winners, great efforts are being made to work collaboratively, to partner with clients, to engage with communities and to focus on value not price. Key to the long-term success of the construction industry, but also the impact construction has on our lives at work, at home, in our education and healthcare and our infrastructure is a focus on outcomes, not short term cost savings.
Lesley Griffiths said last week: “The principles championed by Constructing Excellence in Wales of promoting collaborative working, learning and continuous improvement is key if we seek to obtain the maximum benefit from the money we spend in construction given the resources we use. A strong and efficient construction sector is essential for our future well-being and the Welsh Government fully recognises the challenges ahead we face together.”
To make sure we all come together as an industry and unite to address the challenges ahead – which include renewed resistance arguments about adversarial working and price driven tendering – we need to learn from what has gone well. That is why we never tire of showcasing the CEW Award winners. Look at these facts: the CEW Award winning projects and organisations represent more than £4.5bn. Around £1bn spent within 20 miles of the site and 78% of the spend remained in Wales. We estimate that approximately 2,000 apprenticeships can be directly linked to the CEW Award schemes – i.e. as a direct result of best practice and focusing on outcomes and value more work is created and that value remains in Wales.
If we stick to this plan. If we work together, if we strive to remind people that best practice works then as an industry construction in Wales can deliver the Future Generation goals and principles now.
The winning projects on show at the Senedd last week and the entries for the 2017 awards demonstrate how a collaborative, long term approach to concept, design and delivery can achieve so much more for the people of Wales. (winners brochure)
Download: Call for Entries 2017
Download: How to Enter
Download: Top Tips 2017
Download: Guidance to the Constructing Excellence Regional Awards
Deadline for submissions is 17:00 Monday 27th February 2017.
Winners will be announced at the Awards Dinner to be held on Friday 14th July at the Celtic Manor Resort, Newport
Register your interest to make sure you receive all updates.
Email awards@cewales.org.uk
