The new chief executive of Northampton Borough Council, David Kennedy, has said negotiations to expand the centre are way behind where they should be, but he is confident the work will be done before 2014.

He said: "It's had a number of false starts, but it's now further ahead than it's ever been.

"And hopefully a legal agreement will be signed in the next few weeks, then work can start on the ground.

"It's been a very long process and it's been frustrating but I'm as confident as I can be that it will happen.

"We want it to happen as quickly as possible; 2014 is the date that's being talked about but I think there's every possibility it will be sooner than that.

"But we can't pin an absolute date on these kind of things.

"At the moment it's only where most schemes would be after a year or a year-and-a-half. So a lot of time has been lost."

Mr Kennedy took over the top job at the Guildhall after moving from Barnsley last year.

He said he believed the Grosvenor Centre's owners, Legal & General, which revealed plans to expand the mall in 2000, were still strongly committed to the deal.

He said: "Legal & General need to get a very large amount of private funding to actually fund the expansion and it's not the easiest time to achieve that at the moment.

"But we are now very advanced and I hope things will move forward soon."

Plans for the redevelopment of the Grosvenor Centre were first revealed in July 2000, amid hopes the new centre would be ready by 2005.

The plans included a new department store, seven 'flagship outlets' and 50 smaller shops, built in an extension the size of seven football pitches.

The designs revealed in 2000 are now believed to have been replaced with plans which are more modern and reflect the latest thinking on shopping centre design.