THE report into the financial bumps Cottsway Housing Association has hit will worry its thousands of tenants.

It owns and runs about 4,000 homes but the Housing and Communities Agency said it had discovered financial problems and there was an element of uncertainty about the company’s long-term future.

Cottsway has promised there will be no detriment to residents and no risk to their tenancy. It could, it says, continue bobbing along as a management association – it is the future expansion of its housing stock that is in doubt.

Many housing associations came into being to take the provision of social housing off our district councils and none have ever been declared insolvent.

They are private organisations run not for profit, but there is an inherent danger with such organisations if they become too commercial in their outlook.

It must be remembered what they provide: housing for families who cannot afford the private market. Cottsway should of course pursue financial plans for growth, to offer improved properties.

But it should never have put that core function – to provide a stability of housing to those who need it – under any form of uncertainty.

No matter what reassurances come from the company, its residents will have a sense of unease and that is a failure it must address as keenly as it solves its financial problems.