Conference Centres of Excellence becomes the first new additional member of the Business Visits and Events Partnership, formerly the Business Tourism Partnership.

This brings the total number of organisations and government agencies supporting the Partnership to twenty two.

Conference Centres of Excellence (CCE) is a nationwide group of 36 independent venues, mainly residential, which provide high quality, dedicated facilities and services for business meetings, conferences and events.

Members of Conference Centres of Excellence are required to maintain the highest professional standards in terms of meetings and event support facilities, accommodation and customer care.

Before acceptance into membership, applicants undergo rigorous assessment by a team of industry professionals to ensure they meet the consortium’s  stringent criteria. The process of accreditation requires a venue to be focused on the needs of the customer and to adopt best practice in the way it operates.

In joining the Partnership the Consortium has expressed its intention to play a more active role in representing its members’ interests in policy making and implementation within the business visits and events sector.

“We believe that our consortium is ideally placed to represent the specialist conference centre sector and that the combined experience of our members, which have clients across all key sectors, will be an asset to the vital work of the Partnership,” said Kay England, Chair of Conference Centres for Excellence: “The business tourism sector must have the strongest possible voice in order to achieve the attention and resource it merits.”

Welcoming Conference Centres of Excellence as the first new member of the Business Visits and Events Partnership, Michael Hirst, Chairman of the Business Tourism Partnership said, “The broadening of the Partnership’s remit to include all aspects of the fast growing Events sector within the UK will enable the Partnership to admit many other representative organisations into membership. It must be good for the industry to have an umbrella body that covers the widest possible interests of the sector and facilitates the industry’s ability to speak with one voice and spread best practice.”

He added, “We will be in discussions with other representative bodies from the cultural, sporting and festival event sectors to see how best to work together to ensure the fast growing Events sector secures the recognition it deserves and policies that will help it fulfil its potential.