If you're worried about rising private school fees..

[CurlewKate]

... why not just get a better paid job? It apparently works for poor people.

It's nasty whoever says it.

I was waiting for someone to chime in with this! Finland’s entire system, not just schools is different. But here is the big but, THEY PAY A LOT FOR IT!
Maternity pay for three years? Sounds great! We’d all get to spend more time with our kids but who’s going to pay for that?
Kids don’t start school until they’re 7. This means either more child care or someone at home to be with them.
Maybe we should just plant more money trees to pay for all these?

The odd thing is that Labour getting in would probably benefit me. My ds would be in his a'level year so they'd only get 3 terms' vat out of me. I'd then retire and as a pensioner on a low income would probably benefit from Labour's revised terms on university access.

Yet I think it's a tragedy that so many small, very good schools will be lost because of political dogma. Many Private sector teachers won't transfer to state, because of pupil behaviour. More talent lost !

I won't vote Tory, we need a change but nor can I vote for a Labour govt who indulges in academic vandalism.

This is what this idea have achieved. People enjoying the punishment of the aspiring middle classes.

As I said to you people can get other jobs but why bother in a country that punishes the middle class and high earners every time so absolutely we will look to improve our situation but away from here.

Yes. How about eating less avocado toast?

I went to a private school and so do my children. It is expensive. If this gets through and Labour win, then either get s better job/take in ironing/work two more shifts/eat noodles.

I hear this sort of advice often to the poorest.

I doubt labour have considered that a large amount of schools will close and then where will all those children go? Into state schools that are already oversubscribed and overwhelmed.

Locally two private schools have closed already (one with no notice!) meaning that hundreds of children had no school places. The local high school is already bursting at the seams and there's no plans to build another.

The headline is a vote winner as I don't think the majority parents of state schools will realise the impact on them.

Therefore overall Labour will get additional votes from general population

Brilliant 😂

It won't happen so no idea why people stress about it. I didn't vote Labour when they kept using the sound bite of shutting grammar schools, they still exist thankfully.
It's not Corbyn, they aren't shutting all non state schools they are meerly saying they should pay VAT and rightly so but I should imagine it would take years to put that policy in place.

I did find this thread humorous as the advice giving to the less fortunate generally is a boring life of taking in ironing, cleaning, lentils, no new clothes, batch cooking of 34p a head, no smartphone, TV subscriptions, walk, food banks... now everyone seems to have lost their minds because of a 20% tax which would take years to implement and no doubt schools will get round.

Agree with some of what you say but the figure is 12% for sixth form. Also, while 7/12% may seem a small percentage, certain parts of the country have a much higher % of privately schooled children.

I think the cost of housing in catchment areas of ''good" state schools that happen to be near private schools will go up a fair bit, especially when you consider the general lack of housing stock as there will be intense competition for those houses.

Independent school parent here. We live in a city where a quarter of children attend an independent school (because state provision is woefully poor and under-resourced). Like us, many families are by no means loaded and only just able to scrape together the fees.

Yet another fee hike due to VAT being applied will push many thousands into not being able to afford it. Their kids will need to enter the state system in a city where local schools are already bursting at the seams. How is that going to work for anyone???

And Labour's insistence that money raised through VAT on fees will be spent on education.... have they actually promised to ring-fence that cash? Or will it just disappear into a Treasury black hole? My guess is the latter.

It is worth noting that private healthcare services are VAT exempt (provided they're delivered by a regisetered professional). In fact, the NHS is now using the private healthcare sector ever more widely to shore up and support its own services.

Why should the same not apply to education? If Labour was really interested in improving outcomes for ALL children, they'd not be pursuing such a simplistic, divisive policy, but looking at ways to encourage the private education sector to support the state sector - through local sharing of facilities, best practice, teaching staff etc.

I get the 'joke' as such, I just think that's being rather dismissive of the fact that many people already do scrimp, save and go without to pay school fees and obviously they are going to worry about potentially having to make their child move schools, as all good parents would.

Do you think that a lot of people would vote Labour purely on this proposed policy? I don't think that they would personally?

I also doubt many Labour voters would vote Tory - instead they'll abstain or vote Green/Lib Dem.

I don't see why a more level playing field can possibly be anything other than a good thing. If you're currently privileged enough to pay for private school, and this will tip you over the edge, respectfully, so what? Adjust your expectations or up your income like the rest of us. Your kids will remain immensely privileged, and statistically are still likely to do well. DS had to move schools because we couldn't afford our rent increase. Yeah its no fun, but he coped. At least you have more than 2 months warning. Use all the money you will save on fees for tutors and clubs and buy your privilege that way instead. Honestly.

I think we can safely say that she doesn’t give a shit. I hope it works out for you, that must be stressful.

@Notsureofaname @ChocolateyBiccy

The spread is not even across the Country as CB said. I'm guessing London will have higher than 7% and the good/os schools in London are already oversubscribed. Not sure the current framework can simply absorb the additional numbers. Also there has been no comment on quality of teaching and eductional framework.

It is not simply take this kid out of fee paying and plonk him in a seat in any classroom.

Ensuring that private health services charge VAT would be a vote winner too. A topic for another thread!

But it won't level the playing field in any way shape or form. It will create ghettos of exceptional schools and ghettos of schools to be avoided. It happens now in counties without grammar schools - you know which schools, and by extension areas and estates, to avoid and which ones to move in.

Champagne socialism. Playing liberal idealist with other people's children when you're sitting pretty in an expensive house on an expensive estate in the catchment of an exceptional school filled with children that would otherwise be in private school.

Because cost of living hasn’t affected these people and now they expect sympathy. Completely agree. When young people rightly complain about rising rents and being unable to afford to buy, they’re told to stop buying takeaway coffee and avocados.

Its not delighting in misery, it’s simply reflecting that it’s not the same as being forced to use food banks.

I am a state school teacher who has connections with many colleagues in the private sector. I can say that we will happily accept access to the facilities if offered (and in nearly twenty years of teaching such offers are not yet forthcoming) but my colleagues working in the independent sector would be the first to tell you that they would not last five minutes in our more challenging state school contexts.

I find it incredibly insulting that anyone thinks that teachers in the independent sector hold some mysterious key to superb pedagogy, rather than acknowledging that their superior outcomes come from a self-selecting intake and extensive resources.

I think it's nasty because your advice wasn't asked for by an OP who's trying to save money. You are the OP and you have started a thread, and by your tone, it is clear that you do are sniping, rather than genuinely trying to offer support to someone who is worried about something.

https://ifs.org.uk/publications/tax-private-school-fees-and-state-school-spending

From the report

Combining estimated tax revenues and extra public spending needs, our view is that it would be reasonable to assume a net gain to the public finances of £1.3–1.5 billion per year in the medium to long run as a result of removing tax exemptions from private schools. This would allow for about a 2% increase in state school spending in England, which Labour has proposed would be targeted at disadvantaged students.

Finally, it is possible that the state sector could easily accommodate extra pupils given that overall pupil numbers across England are due to decline by at least 100,000 per year on average up to 2030 – i.e. a total drop of more than 700,000, which is bigger than the total number of children attending private schools

op gratuitously started a nasty thread bashing people who are worried about rises in school fees. That’s not justified because other people have also started nasty threads.

Errrr, Labour is probably not going anywhere near that idea for the reason I mentioned - many NHS treatments are now being delivered privately, therefore blurring the lines between 'state' and 'private' provision. It would be an own goal to enforce a divide.