Public Relations and Communications Association


The Public Relations and Communications Association is a trade association for the public relations sector in the United Kingdom. The association lobbies on behalf of its member companies and also provides a forum for sharing information. It is the largest PR association in Europe, with more than 12,000 members including agencies, in-house communications teams and individual media professionals.
The PRCA aims to raise standards in the PR and communications industry by sharing industry data, information, and best practices, as well as creating networking opportunities.

History

It was founded in 1969, and was originally an organisation for PR agencies; its membership includes 400 agency members, including most of the top 100 UK consultancies; over 100 in-house communications teams from multinationals, UK charities and public sector organisations. The PRCA launched in-house membership in February 2009 and individual membership in October 2011.
In 2001, the PRCA sought a meeting with the Financial Services Authority to develop a code of practice for financial PR consultants.
The PRCA was one of three organisations which founded the UK lobbying self-regulation body, the UK Public Affairs Council, in 2010 - alongside the Association of Professional Political Consultants and the Chartered Institute of Public Relations. However, the PRCA resigned from the UKPAC the following year, in December 2011.
It changed its name to the Public Relations and Communications Association in August 2016.
The PRCA expelled Bell Pottinger in September 2017 after a disciplinary hearing found that a secret campaign by the company to spread racial hatred in South Africa was the worst-ever breach of ethics by a member company. Francis Ingham, the PRCA's director-general, said: "the PRCA has never before passed down such a damning indictment of an agency’s behaviour," and condemning the campaign, which incited racial hatred, as "absolutely unthinkable".