POET laureate Andrew Motion has signed up to judge the poetry section of next year's Bridport Prize.

His involvement was announced at a lunch to celebrate the 2004 competition which attracted over 8,000 entries from 63 countries.

Short stories by an American and an Australian scooped first and second place in the 32nd Bridport Prize, with not one of the 26 prize winners of 2004 being from West Dorset.

All three top prizes in the poetry competition went to UK entries.

An awards lunch was held at the town hall on Saturday to celebrate the winners and thank the team of volunteers and Bridport Arts Centre workers behind the awards.

This year's poetry judge Paul Farley read through around 4,000 poems with the unenviable task of sifting them down to 13 prizewinners.

A team of Bridport volunteer readers sifted through the thousands of stories, which could be up to 5,000 words, before a final selection was sent to judge Jim Crace.

Mr Farley, a teacher, freelance writer and broadcaster who in 2002 won the Whitbread Award for Poetry and was recognised in the Bridport Prize 10 years ago, said: "There's a wealth of fine work out there, and I could have awarded many more prizes had I been able to."

Secondplaced story writer Janey Runci, a fiction writing teacher from Melbourne, Australia, journeyed half way round the world on her own to collect her prize in person.

Hers was one of a wave of entries submitted online this year.

She said: "I heard about the Bridport Prize a couple of years ago from friends - quite a few writers in Melbourne have heard of it.

"It is a wonderful thing to happen and great to get recognition from someone across the world who has read what I have written.

"I am staying in Lyme Regis and the area is just lovely, like being in the middle of all those novels I have read by people like Hardy.

"It is a fantastic event because you can come knowing what you have won and come completely to celebrate."

It is the second time she has entered the award, winning a supplementary prize in 2002.

Chris Huxley, director of Bridport Arts Centre, said: "The Bridport Prize is largely a voluntary-run organisation. "We had just over 8,000 entries, all dealt with by some splendid volunteers."

The annual competition has a £6 entry fee and brings in thousands of pounds for Bridport Arts Centre.

There is a total prize fund of £10,000 with a top prize of £3,000 in each category, £1,000 for second place and £500 for third along with 10 supplementary prizes of £50.

The top 13 stories will be read by literary agents Curtis Brown with a view to representing the writers while the top five poems will be submitted for the Forward Prize, an award not open to the general public.

The Bridport Prize International Creating Writing Competition started in 1973 as a local project to raise money to develop the arts centre and in 1980 became a regional competition with a first prize of £100.

It has always attracted national and international entries.

All entries are judged with no names so inexperienced writers are read the same as those who may have famous names.