The process of deciding how many new homes should be built in Oxfordshire has been a muddy one this week the water got even murkier.

As the South East Plan progresses through consultation towards an examination in public in the autumn, a new Government-commissioned report and an announcement about growth towns called into question some of the central proposals of the plan.

It is almost as if the South East Plan is a sideshow to the real event that is going on in the background.

Both Didcot and Oxford are now on a Whitehall shortlist of towns and cities that could take thousands more homes than is already envisaged.

At the same time, a report commissioned by the Government appears to suggest that the South East Plan does not include adequate proposals for housebuilding and that Oxfordshire is an area that could potentially take more homes.

Reading between the lines, you can see that the South East Plan is being set up for a fall. The argument in Oxfordshire is also beginning to polarise around Didcot or Oxford.

Meanwhile, the policy of the new Liberal Democrat minority-led Oxford City Council is also as clear as mud.

It is hard to tell whether the council now backs the previous administration's call for thousands of homes to be built in the Green Belt.

It says that a review of the Green Belt is a prerequisite to any new homes being built. That is more a statement of the blindingly obvious. The question is does the city council still consider that more homes than are proposed in the South East Plan should be built in and around the city?

It is very hard for those concerned about housing development in Oxfordshire to know where to direct their energies.

Is this battle going to be fought at the inquiry into the South East Plan or is it already being decided in the corridors of Whitehall?