WORCESTER'S bustling city centre is hoping to go one better this year - with the hunt kicking off to find Britain's best High Street.

The Government has just announced the re-launch of the Great British High Street competition, where towns and cities compete to win a share of £50,000 and a bucketload of national publicity.

Last year Worcester made it onto the shortlist of 21 places to be seriously considered by judges, based on its response to the flooding.

The 'Open 4 Business' campaign saw both independent and national stores come together to get the message out through social media, a now infamous chalkboard and a blog run by your Worcester News, that the shops were open.

Adrian Field, from Worcester's Business Improvement District (BID), said it would consider going for the gong again ahead of the July deadline.

"Entering last time around was great for Worcester's profile, it can never do us any harm to be noticed by some of the decision makers' head offices," he said.

"They all look at the footfall, profile of a place and its demographics but it can often be the difference between retailers that think 'let's look at this place' as a result of the competition.

"We were very pleased to be shortlisted last time around so we will certainly look at it again this time with a view to entering."

It comes as Worcester continues to outperform the rest of the region, with the second lowest occupancy rates in the West Midlands behind Solihull.

Alongside the success of the city centre, we also revealed earlier this months how the overall Worcestershire economy was the third fasting growing from 2008 to 2013, behind only London and Oxfordshire, with retail driving a lot of that performance.

Worcester made the competition's shortlist last year after entries from 135 different towns and cities, with Belper in Derbyshire the overall winner.

High Streets minister Penny Mordaunt said: "High streets are a vital part of our economy supporting thousands of jobs in retail and leisure but they are also the heart of all communities providing a great place for friends and family to meet.

"The first competition last year was a tremendous success and I want this year to be even better."

The deadline for entries is Friday, July 17 before a new shortlist is drawn up in August.