Is Bridget Phillipson's tweet accurate?

"Despite not intending to". Do you actually know how many are leaving/have left? 10 in DDs year group so far. You are just peddling lazy Labour assumptions that we can afford to suck it up!

Not sure I follow as "bulk use" is the first time I've seen used as an argument against private schools. Not sure which of my posts you are replying to either.

@twistyizzy they should also have to pay VAT. I'm not sure any of these are the gotchas you think they are as I'm in favour for increased taxes on the richest in society in general.

In terms of headteachers etc., they're panicked by the number of spiteful parents who have written to their local schools to say they want a place - despite not actually intending to leave the private school. I'm sure a few will, but that's life.

What about state boarding schools being exempt? Very interested to hear your take on this one

Yep, wait until that becomes public knowledge and starts impacting people

What about teaching unions and head teacher unions? Because they are also recommending a pause to the plan. It had zero credible research carried out.
Do you care whether it generates any money or is this just a principle of punishing indy sector? Because ot sounds like the latter

Some nurseries are going to have to pay VAT.
If they have a class of mixed age kids (eg 3-5 yr olds) then every child in that class will have VAT added.

It's also crazy that they're saying from January.

Not everything at private schools has to have VAT added. It much more complex than that.

They should delay until at least September to get the system up and running.

Sadly no we arent becuse Labour couldnt do it if we were however it doesn't discount the fundamental logic of the principle of not taxing education. Do you also want nurseries taxing? Because once you accept that it is OK to tax education then you shouldn't single out 1 sector, it should be applied across all sectors.

@twistyizzy I don't care what the French and German say.

The vast majority of state school teachers are excited by Phillipson.

@LovingCritic I've paid tax on the money I spend on myself. But I still pay VAT. I've paid tax on the money I put into my savings but above a certain point I pay taxes on the interest.

Oh and I should add, our parents have paid tax on the money they pay us as school fees already, when they earned it!

And I'll add in my class of 16, six children a that of doctor parents, who send their children private because of the long hours they work providing healthcare to us all through the NHS.

Because you aren't listening. Are you Phillipson?
Teaching unions, head teachers, SEN charities, military personnel groups, lawyers, accountancy firms, French + German diplomats etc etc are all saying pause or stop. Labour, much like yourself, are ignoring it all.

@twistyizzy well we aren't a part of the EU anymore.

The argument is that if you weren't paying those fees you'd have thousands of disposable income that would either be spent or saved, generating tax for the economy.

Except that service has always been zero rated because of EU law. That's the issue, this makes us the first country in Europe tax education. It has already caused diplomatic ruptions with France + Germany because of international schools in the UK. What a legacy for Labour "the first European country to tax education".

Errr? My DD’s independent school does take on state school SEN from the local authority, it doesn’t make a profit, and teachers are paid less than they would get in state, but have less of the pressure. They have a number of ex-state school teachers.

The 6,000 extra teachers this policy is supposed to fund will not fill the gap caused by the huge number of teachers leaving the state system because of the pressures within that system. I personally know of three teachers, qualified less than 8 years, who have quit this year. Maybe the Government should focus on fixing the state system before attacking independents.

I think the point is, that people miss (and I know, having taught 20 years in private), a huge majority of the parents are not rich - they have normal jobs and put aside a large chunk of income to give their child a private education.

In many cases so the child has better access to SEND facilities, or for the built in wraparound care, or boarding.

And based on an average secondary state capitation of £5K per annum our parents save the state £25K approx per child between year 7 & 11.

Nobody has said this though?

Is there not an expectation that when you buy a service, you will pay VAT?

There was the option for private schools to make their current fees inclusive of VAT.

If they haven't done that, take it up with the school.

What bothers me the most is that you get some people saying "fuck the rich, they deserve it". But if PS parents said "fuck the poor, they deserve", we would be completely destroyed.

Yet you can't see how indy currently eases the burden on state? Quite simply it takes 550,000 kids out of state which means it saves the state £4 billion per year whilst those parents already pay taxes to fund state.

@twistyizzy when I suggested that the private sector is used to ease the burden in the same way as the NHS you said no.

I've not seen a comprehensive argument against it that doesn't boil down to "it's not fair!"

Who said that? My child was at state through primary and will again for 6th form. Most parents using indy on a mix and match basis with state. So stop perpetuating the "don't want to mix with state" stereotype because it simply isn't true.

She is ridiculous. It's funny because the state schools in our local area have Astro turf pitches that are brilliant- so much so that the local football clubs rent them out on a weekend. The local state schools get a coach to the brand new shiny Becky Adlington swim school once a week and the private school has a run down pool that's been there for longer than my secondary school child has been alive. 😅 There are also 2 state schools within a 20 mile radius that have pools of their own. The local state schools have access to services like Kooth and other mental health support meanwhile the private was without a school nurse for almost a year. Clearly there are plenty of advantages to private vs state I.e variety of subjects, smaller class sizes, sports coaching etc etc but what I'm saying is, it's clearly not as simple Bridget seems to think. Added VAT won't help anybody's education, it will probably make it worse for all.

Very telling that as soon as the idea of state school children being sent into private schools in order to ease the burden the answer is "well no!"

Just admit you don't want your children around the children who go to state schools.

I find it incredibly sad that so many refuse to see the privilege that they have.

I teach in a private school, we don't have embossed stationery... and our pool was built in the 60's, so all paid for....

The local state grammar does have an embossed letter head and has a much bigger poor built 6 years ago, that we hire sometimes!

Are we? I don't know any of my colleagues who are overly enamoured, we have the breakfast club it looks like if it happens we'd be expected to staff for no additional pay, and not really anything about improving training, retention, crumbling buildings, reworking the curriculum etc. What aside from crowing about the VAT on private schools (which won't improve the number of teachers in state schools anyway) is particularly inspiring?