Supermarket Aldi has confirmed that it wants to build a supermarket in Maryport.

A spokeswoman for the German discount supermarket said it was looking at the town as a location for a new store. 

She denied rumours that there were plans to take over the town's Co-op store on Curzon Street and added that no formal plans for the supermarket here had been formalised yet.

At present, the town's only supermarket is the Co-op.

Lidl want to build its largest store in the country at Milltoft. 

Debbie Wright, chairwoman of the Love Maryport team, said she welcomed any investment in Maryport.

She said: “Any new business in the town has to be good, especially if it succeeds in encouraging people to shop locally.

“At the moment we lose a lot of trade to Workington, for instance.

“The only thing I would say is, if Aldi came we would hope that we could work with it, as we are trying to do with Lidl, to ensure that Maryport generally would benefit from the new supermarket.”

She said the town team has been speaking to Lidl since it announced plans to build in Maryport to find ways that people shopping there could be encouraged into the rest of the town.

Allerdale Investment Partnership, which was formed last year by Allerdale council and Lucent Strategic Land Fund to market surplus council land for development, brokered a deal for Lidl to come to town. 

It said this week that the partnership and Allerdale’s legal and planning officers were "in the process of finalising the last details of the contract with Lidl’s legal team."

Once these last details are finished the way is clear for Lidl to start building.

Meanwhile, Lidl has announced that it is planning to build a supermarket in Cockermouth on the site of the former Fairfield Garage, creating 40 new jobs.