Accounts reveal HA's £11m hole.

Bosses at the housing group that absorbed the ailing West Hampstead housing association (WHHA) have revealed that they are working to recoup a build-up of debts topping £11m.

Genesis Housing Group announced to its shareholders this week a small loss on operational activities at WHHA, plus a deficit for the year of £5.5m and further accumulated "historical" debts - which adds up to £11.5m.

While a program of property sales is planned to clawback the money, Genesis this week reaffirmed its promise that no WHHA tenants would lose thier homes as a result of the situation.

Genesis chief executive Anu Vedi said the operational loss was smaller than the previous year due to "tight financial and managment controls" introduced by Genesis when they took over as managing agents in February. (2001). He said that the deficit was due to interest paid on historic debts, one-off costs totalling £4m, accounting for liabilities previously not known and accounting policy changes, such as writing off furniture as an asset.

"The accumulated deficit is not just for one year. It is the historic deficit of the organisation to date", he said.

Temporary housing and local authority contract management is to stay with WHHA, although the association's name will be changed "to reflect the increased scope of its activities", said Genesis. WHHA's permanent housing units have been transferred to the managment of Paddington Churches housing association (PCHA).

But the Chair of WHHA Tenants Association, Peter Rutherford, said that tenants still believed they would be ousted from their properties one way or another.

"PCHA recently took me to court to say that I had an assured tenancy, not a secure tenancy. The only significant difference between the two is that with assured they can use Ground 9, which means that if they can make a reasonable alternative offer they can evict me.

"When this group took over WHHA the debt was only £3m. I believe the debt is ballooning out of control, and within three or four weeks, 11 - 12 of us will get notice to quit".

He called on the Housing Corporation to recall troubleshooter Greg Lomax "to sort out the mess".

Vedi said: "Had we not viewed becoming involved as a moral obligation, the association may well have collapsed with serious ramifications for its tenants".