Confusion reigns over plans by a discount German food retailer to open its first Oxfordshire store.

Cowley councillors have in principle supported plans for a Lidl supermarket in Blackbird Leys - just days after plans were rejected.

Lidl, which sells cheaper-than-average food, has made a bid to Oxford City Council to open a store on the site of the Hartwell Ford car showroom in Watlington Road.

But on Monday councillors on the council's south east area committee, which represents Blackbird Leys, Rose Hill, Littlemore and Northfield Brook, opposed the plans.

A final decision will be taken by Oxford City Council's strategic planning committee on August 25. Lidl is likely to appeal should its plans be rejected.

Planning officers say the application clashes with the Local Plan and would prompt unsustainable levels of traffic.

A Lidl spokesman said: "With the greatest respect to planning officers, their report is naive and misleading. Lidl have found 75 per cent of customers would live within a five-minute drive from the store."

City council planning officer Andy Lewis said: "The store would generate a significant number of car journeys, which would be detrimental to the area."

At the Cowley area committee meeting on Wednesday councillors voted three to one in favour of the plans.