To ask if anyone is clued up on the challenge this week to VAT on school fees?

@xenia - I think the real problem is that a lot of working women are just thinking, to hell with all the stress, let’s work less and use state schools instead and top up with tutoring and drive them around to extra curricular. It is that aspect of taxing the top cohort more and more which is massively starting to backfire now and will quickly affect overall tax take. There is just no point working extra to go over 100k anymore. Especially now with the pension changes as well. It is work less benefits Britain, all the way. Or join the civil service.

That is an awful lot of money but if it costs £250,000 just to repair one lift in Yorkshire I suppose that is what the state's choice is.

I cannot predict whether the litigation will be won or not. I hope it will be won but we shall see. I suppose if private schools do not have to make so many or any bursary places available then that might help keep fees down and if fewer children go to the very hard to get into most academic day private schools where many apply per place and most who apply don't get in, that might mean those who can afford it might have a slightly better chance of getting in - that is the only silver lining in the cloud for those parents who just about can afford to pay a bit extra. Those parents will then have less spending money so less will go into the economy more generally which may not be very good for the state.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c36e106n667o

Yes but what are the benefits you’re hoping to see in a few years?

@Musicofthespiers it really has brought out the worst side of some

Some of us don't have to wait years to notice any fallout from this policy. It is happening right before our eyes to our own children/those we know, in real time, all the while goaded on every social media platform by gleeful people who are enjoying every minute. Friends in other countries are looking on and wondering what on earth is happening to this country. Taxed to the hilt for doing the right thing for your SEND child, what a world.

Correct. They want all kids in a 1 size fits all model, and as we know that fails more kids than it serves. Just look at their other education policies around inclusion

I entirely disagree on your take, but as I said, we’ll see in a few years.

The problem is that the negatives of the policy (i.e. reduction in education choice, closing schools, upset children, damaging vulnerable children, job losses, increased burden on state schools) are actually what the supporters and policy architects consider benefits. It’s only about spite.

I can’t see them backing down on this unfortunately OP.

TBF, there are - anecdotally - a fair number of fee-paying parents who are discovering that at least some state schools are surprisingly good. A Spectator columnist said this recently, FWIW.

The problem the government has to face is that class warfare against independent schooling is only going to end in tears for the politicians. Even if the courts don’t strike this down, the money lost will be severely embarrassing.

I don’t support private schooling - I would never have paid for it: too many children, not enough money and too much uncertainty - but I don’t oppose it either. The ‘red meat’ left-wingery on display with this policy is loathsome and destructive.

I am not sure all state education is broken. I think most people who can buy their way into better schools via catchment etc one way or another. I think the system is not working for children with SEND and is also not working for many very poor children. As for middle class kids with books at home, parents are often plugging the gaps inevitably.
The left ideology has always been the hope that children learn from others by osmosis. So for example, the fact that our kids read Classics from Year 3, eg played the violin and piano and went on trips to museums, theatre, abroad is somehow meant to inspire other kids they are at school with. Not sure how, but they are hoping that social and cultural capital is “shared”.
If you look at what Labour governments have achieved in eg Wales and compare it to England, it is clear that Labour is worse with education than Tories.

then we’ll see in the next few years who’s right and who’s wrong about the benefits or not

even assuming the policy collects all the cash they claim is possible (eg. every child in private school pays the 20% and no children leave as a result), there is not a cat in hells chance they're recruiting 6,000 extra teachers, let alone 6,000 extra teachers who make it to 5 years post qualification.

Until any Government recognises that education is broken, it won't get fixed. This is just a game of smoke and mirrors and by this thread alone (there have been plenty of others), the Government is winning.

Its more about if Neidle can separate the two, rather than mumsnet posters.

Yes, really? I can separate Neidle the active Labour Party member from Neidle the tax specialist. It’s called fact checking.

Really @SabrinaThwaite ?

Tax Policy Associates is a brilliant website.
However, independent and non-partisan means something different at a common sense level, to many people.

I hadn’t realised 8 or so months ago what Dan Neidle’s close affiliation is with the Labour Party. That is all.
So when I originally read some of his comments on private school taxation I simply assumed there was no political bias whatsoever in any of them. I only found out about the links later on.
Of course a professional can provide independent tax advice at the same time.

We shall see in due course what happens with this court case. I find it quite worrying.

And?

BBC Verify changed its wording from ‘independent tax expert’ to ‘founder of the independent Tax Policy Group’.

Interesting that Guido didn’t refute Neidle's analysis used by BBC Verify.

You're grasping at straws (every pun intended).

Personally, I am going to be incredibly pissed off at the Labour Party if they lose in court on human rights grounds.
Because the sleaze etc and the hypocrisy undermines the whole political system.
It is exactly why people like Trump and Farage then get in. So like I have said all along, I really really hope they have very watertight legal advice that they won’t lose.

@SabrinaThwaite - well this is what he CLAIMS on his website and he is specifically quoting:
“What the top fact-checker sleuths over at Verify have failed to mention is that their “independent expert” is a senior and longtime Labour activist. Dan Neidle wrote in his successful pitch for election to Labour’s National Constitutional Committee in 2022:
“I’ve been a member of the Labour Party for 35 years and have been a ward secretary, ward chair and CLP Secretary. More recently, I’ve been the agent for two MPs and dozens of local councillors, and helped turn seats that were once marginal into Labour strongholds. I’ve practised law for 22 years and have advised candidates, MPs and campaign groups on electoral law, successfully fighting off attempts by other parties to use the legal system against us. I know the Labour Party rulebook.”
The NCC is “a senior organ of the UK Labour Party concerned with discipline.” Neidle was election agent for both Stella Creasy and Emily Thornberry, for whom he deployed such savvy electoral tricks as sending letters from fake neighbours urging a vote for Labour.””

@Araminta1003 You claimed ‘Just on the political front, both the IFS chap Luke Sibieta and Dan Neidle seem to have links to the Labour Party which have been exposed in the press. ’

Dan Neidle’s links to the Labour Party don’t need to be ‘exposed in the press’ - he is upfront about it.

The only BBC Verify ‘controversy’ is that it quoted Neidle’s analysis of the agricultural IHT changes and the Telegraph and Order Order flagged it up (no surprise there).

I haven’t missed anything.

BTW, I don’t count Guido Fawkes as a reliable source for anything - he is a right wing gossip blogger and click bait merchant. I am surprised that you do.

Can you remind us of the benefits?

Still, we’re in December now, and it comes in January? Seems like a done deal, and then we’ll see in the next few years who’s right and who’s wrong about the benefits or not.
As with most things the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle.

@SabrinaThwaite - there was some controversy with Dan Neidle and BBC Verify very recently. Did you miss that? The more right leaning papers called him a Labour activist and some of the whistleblowing sites seem to be going further than that. No idea if that is true or not. If you want to go have a look, there are sites like GuidoFawkes on Twitter and their own site. I am not linking that here but go take a look.
Some of us read the far left and the right sites.
And the only reason I took a look in the first place is because some of the statements made about the human rights angle were a little too bullish, in my opinion.

Ha ha, I did put too much thought into that. And yes I know it’s a coincidence that really should have been avoided,
My point is though, that the policy is blatantly purely ideological and should be presented as such…. not othering a group of children and whipping up anger to hide the fact that it’s going to be a costly policy (not just in tax payer funds),

I’m glad you’ve recognised it as a ‘fictional scenario’.

Have you thought about a career writing conspiracy fiction?