Oxford will always be the home of the Mini, bosses have confirmed.

BMW has admitted a four-wheel drive version of the car will be built in another plant, but stressed that this did not mean all production would switch from the Cowley works to another country.

Spokesman Martin Harrison said: "The Oxford plant will remain the home of Mini and the centre of our operations."

There has been widespread speculation that the new car, known as the Sports Activity Vehicle (SAV), will be built at BMW's plants in Graz, Austria, or Spartanburg, in South Carolina, in the US.

Mr Harrison said no decision had been made on where the car would be made, nor when it would be launched.

But he admitted that the Cowley plant's capacity of 260,000 cars a year would be reached soon following the launch of the new Clubman model and with a new version of the convertible likely to be produced by the end of next year.

He added: "When we build the SAV is entirely dependent on where production will be."

As a result, the SAV is still on the drawing board but Mr Harrison confirmed it will definitely go into production.

Mini sales are currently booming with recent figures showing a 25 per cent increase on last year.

The Cowley factory is expected to build more than 220,000 cars by the end of the year, which will be a new production record.