SUPERMARKET giant Tesco has been given planning permission to extend its out-of-town Blackburn store, despite concerns it could kill off town centre trade.

Chamber of Trade bosses pleaded with the council to turn down the application, saying that Tesco had already taken a lot of town centre business to its Hill Street, Blackburn, base.

But councillors approved the plan, which will see the store's floor size grow from 28,386 sq ft to 39,526 sq ft.

Tesco said it wanted to remodel the shop so that they could fit in a wider range of goods, including more non-food products.

Ronnie O'Keeffe, president of Blackburn Chamber of Trade, told Blackburn with Darwen's planning and highways committee in a letter: "The store has already taken away a large proportion of retail sales from Blackburn town centre and the market since the superstore was built.

"An extension to the store to enable it to sell an even wider range of goods will damage town centre trading even further.

"The council has an on-going programme of regeneration for Blackburn to encourage shoppers to stay in the town centre or return to it for their shopping.

"An increase at this store for a greater retail sales range would have the opposite effect to that the council is trying to achieve."

But Richard Gee, a spokesman for Tesco, told the meeting: "We believe the size of the extension will not have a detrimental effect on the town centre.

"We have a store in the town centre, Tesco Metro, which we remain committed to.

"More than 95 per cent of our customers are in favour of the extension.

"It will create 48 new jobs and give Blackburn the Tesco it deserves. We will have a wider range of products as well."

As well as creating more space for goods, aisles in the store will be widened and the store given a lighter, brighter look.

An initial report to the planning and highways committee indicated that Tesco was not prepared to guarantee 'in perpetuity' the future of the Metro store in the town.

But at the meeting, Mr Gee assured the committee that it had no plans to close the town centre store, which was opened in 1971 and refurbished in 1995, employing 64 members of staff.

The firm will, however, have restrictions placed on the use of the sales floor.

Just 13,135 sq ft of the floor can be used for non-food products.