In response to Charles Holcombe (Letters, March 25), it is indeed "difficult to contemplate" that council housing makes a loss. This is because it doesn't. The Government takes about £800 per tenant every year, which it uses for other purposes, money which should be re-invested, saving the necessity of giving away our homes to a Housing Association.

Housing Associations are not "benefactors", taking over an unprofitable burden from the goodness of their hearts.

They are multi-million pound businesses, largely as a result of the handouts they receive from the Government, and frequently demolish the rented homes they acquire and replace them with flats for sale on the private market.

But then, if Charles Holcombe lives in a world where private landlords buy up houses on the buy-to-let market because they are moved by charity to "provide essential accommodation", I suppose he'd believe anything.

-Ruth Arundell, Defend Council Housing In Brighton & Hove