An Oxfordshire County Council chief has hit out at the need for taxpayers' money to be spent on boosting broadband provision across the UK.

Under the Broadband Delivery UK framework, hundreds of millions of pounds will be effectively used to subsidise the improvement of existing networks by private communications companies.

In Oxfordshire alone, the scheme will see the council spend £10 million of its own cash and £3.7 million from the government to fill in the gaps left by previous rollouts.

However, cabinet member for communications Nick Carter is annoyed that the money needs to be spent at all, reports the Oxford Times.

"It's ridiculous that public money is having to put right what the market should have sorted out years ago," he declared.

BT is currently working on its own super-fast broadband rollout independent of the government-backed scheme, but this project will only bring next-generation speeds to two-thirds of homes and businesses.

The deployment is largely targeting urban areas, leaving many rural communities stuck with slower speeds.

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