Business in the Community (BITC), the leading UK organisation working to promote responsible business practices, held its annual awards ceremony on 11 July. The Co-operative Bank captured the top award for ‘Company of the Year’ at an event that also rewarded companies for responsible activities in such areas as the environment, diversity and innovation. The creation of a comprehensive European award scheme to highlight responsible business behaviour is expected to be one of the key recommendations of a green paper on corporate social responsiblity (CSR) that the European Commission will publish next week.
Background:
The BITC Awards for Excellence were set up in 1997 and are aimed at rewarding the leaders in best practice in CSR.

Issues:
The focus of the BITC awards is on programmes that address environmental or social issues and companies whose business practices have a positive impact on society and result in long term competitive advantage.

The programme awards went to:

Cause-related marketing – Bettys & Taylors of Harrogate;
Focused action – Lloyds TSB;
Innovation – Tesco;
Investing in young people – Lattice;
Neighbourhood renewal – Lloyds TSB;
Global leadership – TV Globo, Brazil;
Power in partnership – Lattice and Groundwork UK.
The company awards went to:

Environment – 3M United Kingdom;
Community investment – ASAS, Capital One;
Diversity – JP Morgan;
Impact on society – Co-operative Bank;
Positive impact by small and medium-sized enterprises – Big Issue in the North, Westfield Health Scheme