Folk Awards, like any other culture/arts awards, are marketing exercises. The awards promote the artists, the broadcasters get an audience, and the sponsors get PR. Nothing wrong with that.

The BBC Radio 2 Folk Award is run by a national ie UK radio channel (Before anyone pipes up, yes its run by Smooth Ops on behalf of the Radio 2). Radio 2 has a UK-wide remit, so the awards cover the whole of the UK. From what I can tell from a quick Google, there is a Scottish Young Trad Performers award run by BBC Radio Scotland, which has a specific geographic remit. The main Scottish award seems to be run by an independent organisation called "Hands up for Folk", which is dedicated to promoting Scottish folk music.

The short answer to WAV's original question is that no one with a specifically English remit, and the funding, has tried to organise one. For good or bad, there isn't a BBC England (and for god's sake, WAV, please don't start a thread about that) and in England both the BBC and folk arts organisations tend to be regional rather than national.

The lack of an English Folk Award isn't because of some conspiracy against English music and culture, it's because of the lack of a suitable infrastructure and someone able and willing to organise one.

If you want an English Folk Award, WAV, it's simple. Form a suitable organisation with a committee and constitution, get the necessary funding and sponsorship and media coverage, and put it on yourself. Provided it was done on purely musical grounds, I'd have no objection. But what makes me, and many others, wary is that you also have a political (if not party-political) agenda which many of us are suspicious of, and object to having the music we love associated with.