Flooding of state schools by ex indie students fails to materialise

This is not true at all. A lot of people in France choose private if they want a religious element in the education of their children. If you want some catechism (as an example but same applies to jewish and muslim faith) then you go private. First communion and such like are done at school.

There are enough state places for every child in the country, there is no disputing it. I predict some on the outer edges of catchments of popular schools are going to lose out on their school of choice in years to come as more switch sector/never start private. The bigger question is whether the VAT raised will actually offset when factoring in the cost of educating those that switch/never start private education and the cost of SEN provision that is going to be needed for those who have now been priced out of the sector. If ends up costing more (which is my prediction for the long term), what was the point in the policy?

There's also the big drop in birth rates. I think the point of the policy was to make future tax hikes in other areas more palatable, same with wf allowance.

And as I already said certainly in London there is a trend for private dc to move to state 6th forms already. Plus even without the VAT hike, mortgage rates & COL may push more into state.

The 6th forms near me have had similar numbers to previous years & we didn't have more register for the 11plus test. I expect it's normal for there to be fluctuations depending on location & birth rates so don't think my experience can be extrapolated any further.

I don’t have a view on the whole country, I can just say from our personal experience, that two of the local state 6th forms have communicated to us that they had record applicants this year, and we have not heard back from the third school. Places will be more competitive this year—the two we’ve heard from are clearly trying to manage expectations at this stage.

Several posters are missing the point. It is far too soon to tell and current data is going to show no change. The government have also deliberately applied this in a way where it becomes very difficult to see any negative impact in the short term

There are a group of parents who choose private education as the default and their children will remain in the sector regardless of VAT. They can comfortably afford the fees, 20% is not really that much in the grand scheme for them.

The other group (like myself) are those that have chosen private for a specific reason with no commitment to remain in the sector throughout their child's education. A lot of parents at my DC small prep school fit into this category - we have chosen this school because of lower fees compared to through schools and wanted our options open. We can afford the fees but make noticeable sacrifices to do so and 20% hike is significant. The majority can make changes to their finances to fund the VAT until the next natural breakpoint - I only know of two children leaving the school mid way through primary due to VAT and they are still staying until the end of the academic year.
In our school, the trend previously was for these parents to eventually choose private secondary because of career advancements making secondary fees an option with the same level of sacrifice. Historically, around 10% have moved into state sector but these parents all apply for state secondaries and always have done. We are certainly seeing change as 40-60% are now switching sector. A few current Y6 moved house within the past 18 months specifically to be in catchment for particular schools, 5 families (and counting) have done this in my DC Y4 group.

There are also those who are currently in state primaries with the intention of moving into the private sector. They also will likely be applying for a state place.

So from what I can see, the net impact and allocation on state places last week will remain similar. Some who are in private and have moved into catchment will get places on distance so there has been changes in catchments of some schools but there could be other explanations - we can only speculate when the government refuse to collect data.

As a PP said, the VAT policy is not going to have a major catastrophic impact on the education sector. In our area, the competition for the higher performing schools has increased and will likely stay at this level or increase further.

There are enough state places for every child in the country, there is no disputing it. I predict some on the outer edges of catchments of popular schools are going to lose out on their school of choice in years to come as more switch sector/never start private. The bigger question is whether the VAT raised will actually offset when factoring in the cost of educating those that switch/never start private education and the cost of SEN provision that is going to be needed for those who have now been priced out of the sector. If ends up costing more (which is my prediction for the long term), what was the point in the policy?

Is that for all 6th forms? I've not read anything to suggest that but happy to be proved wrong.

Seems like this year’s applicants are beating previous records.

It's been a trend in recent years to move to state 6th forms.

My pint is that from my perspective and experience over the past few months is that there appear to be many families jumping ship from private to state at 6th form, and there are record applications for the same number of state places as previous years.

We’re applying to 3 local state 6th forms. School responses, per my post, are “record applications” this year.

@CowTown I was commenting primarily on 11+ applications, sorry if that wasn’t clear. I know very little about the 6th form “landscape” other than that it’s different from 11+ in many respects.

@CowTown taking a guess you are applying for a very high performing private school vs average private school. I fully expected with CoL everyone is weighing up average private schools and only paying out if the school is better than the local state option hence why applicants for the top private schools are up - people want results for their money.

In a year or two I would love to see stats on number of applicants at the top private schools vs average private schools and how they have changed since pre vat.

I know a quite some people who will hold onto their state school place - local comps or grammars - until their DCs actually join the independent senior school of their choice in September. Usually for those stretching a lot for school fees and are not comfortable with higher fees with VAT or the current economic climate. They feel victimised too. Not great morally but I understand the sentiment.

Eh…I’m not so sure about this. We’re in the middle of applying to 3 Sixth Forms. Saw some ex-private kids we know (the year above DC), who are clearly now state pupils, giving tours at the state school open evenings.

As far as applications go…
School 1 sent us a letter after the application deadline closed, stating that they had a record number of applicants this year, and asked us to send in further evidence of DC’s attainment—previous school reports and mock results (presumably to further whittle down the pool of applicants).
School 2 sent us a letter after the application deadline closed, stating that they too have had a record number of applicants this year, and they are sorry, but they are not considering us for admission, and wish us the best of luck. I was surprised by this, because DC’s mock results significantly surpassed their entry requirements.
School 3 - haven’t heard anything yet.

No-one is obliged to apply for state schools. However, it has long been common for parents to apply for a place at a state school even though they intend to use an independent school. And no, they wouldn't apply to any old state school. They would apply to the better performing ones. Remember that they have to apply by the end of October for secondary schools, at which stage they may not know whether they've managed to get a place at an independent school. And, even if it is just a backup against something unexpected, they want a proper backup. They don't want their child to end up in a sink school if they can't go to the independent school.

Sometimes school catchment shrinks because another school has rating downgraded or loses good reputation (see Holland Park sch and Fortismere).
Or school gains reputation due to good exam results etc.
Increase in # of applications to a particular school doesn't necessarily mean increase in # of applicants in the area.
I know at least 3 schools with catchment shrinking from year to year even before VAT and private pupils wouldn't even look at their direction even now.

The application behaviour won’t have changed this year so of course the NOD stats you have mentioned won’t have changed either.

I don't agree with this. Surely if 2 years ago someone had a private school offer then they would have applied to any old state school as they were obliged to submit a state application whereas this year if someone who previously would have considered private but now are going state, they would be more targeted in their approach and apply to the better performing state schools.

The school I mentioned above where catchment shrank from 2 miles to 1 mile also had 531 applicants in 2024 vs 630 in 2025.

@ICouldBeVioletSky it looks more like wishful thinking - again.

Genuinely not meaning to sound rude but you still seem to be missing the point.

Catchment areas/ first choice allocations staying the same on national offer day tells us nothing either way, because indie applications have always applied for state as well as private. The application behaviour won’t have changed this year so of course the NOD stats you have mentioned won’t have changed either.

There may or may not be a “crunch” - but at the moment there is no way to tell.

FWIW I think there will be a relatively small effect overall. No particularly noticeable effect in most places (thanks in part to falling birth rate) but a few hotspots where it is more apparent (fewer places coming up on continuing interest so catchments not growing from NOD/fewer ultimately getting first choice of school). Not the disaster predicted by some posters, but not “no effect” either.

@ICouldBeVioletSky there will be no "crunch" if we are talking about natural entry points - even in popular school areas catchment didn't shrink.

VAT also didn't make impact on % of British pupils allicated their 1st choice for 25/26.

There are a few different issues at play.

Whether there will be enough school places is one of those, and thanks to a drop in birth rate it may turn out that overall there are enough (though there may be localised issues/shortages).

However, we can’t tell anything at the moment because the overwhelming majority of private school applicants have always also applied to state schools. So no one was really expecting a massive upturn in application numbers at this stage.

As per PP any “crunch” will come in relation to the acceptance rate, if there is a shift from applicants using state school as a backup to using independent school as a backup and now accepting state school places in greater numbers.

If this happens it won’t be apparent until the first round of continuing interest at the earliest. But really it will take years for the effect to come through as some parents try to keep their kids in private schools until a natural exit point, while others who would have sent their kids private at 4+, 7+, 11+, 13+ or 6th form now no longer do so.

“There might be enough school places” also isn’t an answer for the massive disruption that this will cause to those families who do have to pull their kids out of indies, especially those halfway through exam courses and those with SEND.

Nor does it support the (ha ha) rationale for this policy of raising funds to improve state education. Every child that moves to state (or who doesn’t go to indie after all) ends up costing the public purse. Any SEND kids moving over will cause already very thin SEND provision to be stretched even further.

So the policy could end up causing a net drain on public finances. But we may struggle to find out as for some reason the government is not attempting to collect the relevant data…🧐

Don't you think it doesn't matter if these families accept state school places or not as long as there's enough secondary school places for everyone?
I'm looking at last distance offered for a number of massively oversubscribed state secondaries (London) and it didn't change for 2025/2026 in comparison to 2 previous years.

It's far too early days to know this!! Most families with kids in independent schools I know (including me!) are waiting for an opportune moment such as change in school year, not sending younger siblings to independent school (us) or starting state sixth form in September rather that stay on. I suspect it will take a good year or 2 before the effects kick in.

There will definitely be a squeeze on school places in our area - they have been over subscribed already (not new) and lots of house building in our area too (several estates) so unless the government can create a lot more school places quickly, it will affect everyone.

Our area has some good state sixth forms nearby - my DC and most of his peers are moving to one of those now.

I think both my DC independent schools are feeling it... for example, one has decided after hundreds of years as an esteemed single sex school, to suddenly go co-ed - that is obviously not the school's line but it's obvious.

Once a private school has closed, that will be it. No one will open one in this climate - my children all attended one a few years ago that was closed, there are a lot of schools closing down.

You don't see the government squeezing out private hospitals or healthcare?!! Oh no, they are using private hospitals to reduce waiting times!!

They simply don't have the data yet to make this claim.

Pre-2025 it was perfectly normal for every family intending or considering private to put in simultaneous applications to both indie and state schools, and then decide in April before the acceptance deadlines. When a family decides to go with their indie offer the state place is released and there's a second round of state allocations

All this article is saying is that there's no more applications to state than normal for the main-transition-point yeargroups. That's entirely to be expected. The "exodus", if it happens, will manifest in a few weeks time with a massive increase of families accepting their state offer rather than releasing it for 2nd-round applications.