Hunt tosses 27 cities into broadband cash bunfight

Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt has laid down the gauntlet for 27 cities to bid for £50m government funds to be in with a chance of gaining "ultrafast" broadband networks by 2014.

A strict set of criteria was laid out by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) today.

The cash pile was allocated by Chancellor George Osborne during his Budget Statement to the House of Commons in March this year.

But only 10 of those 27 cities earmarked for potential public funding will be selected for the broadband speed boost.

Osborne will announce the winners of that process in his Autumn Statement, the DCMS said. The areas covered by that upgrade investment will be those parts not "served by the private sector".

Here's the full list of cities that can bid for the funds:

Aberdeen; Brighton & Hove; Cambridge; Chelmsford; Coventry; Derby; Dundee; Exeter; Gloucester; Kingston upon Hull; Leicester; Londonderry / Derry; Newport; Norwich; Oxford; Perth; Peterborough; Plymouth; Portsmouth; Preston; Salford; Southampton; Stoke-on-Trent; Sunderland; Swansea; Wolverhampton; and York. ®