Pensioners face being moved from their sheltered accommodation -- to make way for new housing.

Oxford Citizens Housing Association (OCHA) plans to bulldoze 36 flats in Lucas and Remy Place, Meadow Lane, Iffley, Oxford, and replace them with 28 larger properties.

Tenants have been offered £3,400 compensation and the option of being rehoused, but many are reluctant to give up their homes.

Pensioners living at South Oxfordshire Housing Association-owned Badgers Close, Forest Hill, and Windows Court, Wheatley, are fighting similar eviction plans.

OCHA tenants will be given the option of moving back to the Iffley development, but there will not be space for everyone and the rent will go up. OCHA operations director Andrew Smith said Lucas and Remy Place needed upgrading and the tenants were an important part of the consultation process.

He said: "It is a very difficult issue as it is very disruptive, particularly when older and vulnerable people are involved. Nobody will be out on the street -- we have a lot of sheltered accommodation across Oxford city."

But tenants, many of whom are in their 90s, said they were terrified of being turfed out -- and feared they could be rehoused away from friends and family. All the residents who talked to the Oxford Mail were too worried to be named.

A 90-year-old woman, who has lived there since 1986, said: "I am very alarmed at the thought of moving. I am 90 -- at my age I don't want to move. It is all very unsettling. What worries me is nobody knows where they are going."

A 68-year-old resident said: "I sold my home to move here. I have got a lot of friends here and I hate moving. It is a nightmare."

Another Lucas Place resident said she feared she would not be able to afford to live at the new development.

She said: "It is all up in the air. There are such a lot of rumours flying around and everybody is frightened."

Mr Smith said tenants were being offered the chance to be rehoused now because the development might not go ahead for another two years.

He said: "For some people, it feels like it is hanging over them so if people want to move now we will help them.

"If we can't house everyone at Lucas and Remy Place we will work very closely with them and their families to find suitable alternative accommodation."

Residents have called a meeting at Lucas Place and Remy Place on Sunday (May1) at 4pm to discuss the plans, and a second meeting, organised by OCHA, is being held at Hawkwell House Hotel, in Iffley, on Thursday at 2pm.