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

[CurlewKate]

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

Well said Usernamehell.
OP needs to take a long hard look at themselves. Jealousy and bitterness eat people up. Sad.

Well done for your spiteful thread. I hope you feel good about yourself 👏

Sunak lost 11bn when he forgot to insure against interest rises as chancellor

1.5bn to spend on state education is not insignificant.

No issues with revising the triple lock and rebalancing education for the young.

We are talking about the Labour Party here. You know, the party with the ideas about redistribution of tax! Vote Conservative if you do not like it.

Couldn't agree more re: funding state schools adequately - but would you be willing to pay more taxes a la the Finnish progressive tax system? I would.

"You could improve state schools first" - yep, but the money has to come from somewhere and no-one seems willing to part from any of their 'hard earned cash' to adequately fund the public services, as they do in Finland.

Whatever your political views, i think it says something about the person if you are excitedly crowing over the fact that a significant group of children will have to change schools - something that is universally acknowledged as detrimental to both children’s happiness & academic success
Agree with this, and it's not the very wealthy elite who will be ones with children affected. It will be fairly middle of the road middle class families who've made the best choices for their children in that they can in their circumstances.

I always feel deeply suspicious of anything designed to pit working class and middle class families against each other because the people pulling the strings and fuelling the conflict are people with so much money not to be affected by any of it.
It's no different to immigration rhetoric where the people in charge slash public services and the economy, but tell average Joe Blogs that it's single parents/immigrants/asylum seekers/benefits claimants etc who are to blame for poor services.

I always feel deeply suspicious of anything designed to pit working class and middle class families against each other because the people pulling the strings and fuelling the conflict are people with so much money not to be affected by any of it.

Absolutely. They can have a laugh, maybe vote Labour even (as per pp), and be secure no one is going to take them to task on the real gap

My kids are at state schools.
I am delighted this will level the playing fields a bit.
The Uber rich wil always do better than the rest of us.

All those worrying about their kids' education, or the impact of having to go to a state school. That's how it's always been for the rest of us.

For clarity again. There are very few bursaries or scholarships to private schools which are more than a nod to slightly less well off members of the same demographic as the full feel players. There are a few honourable exceptions-but very few.

The gap that increased under 13 years of a Conservative government?

Amused to see that the "politics of envy" brigade are starting to emerge. It is depressing that they don't have enough imagination to think why someone might be opposed to private education for any other reason. It's definitely a case of judging others by your own standards.

What are you using? Not sure economic measurement shows that it was higher in 2008

https://www.statista.com/statistics/872472/gini-index-of-the-united-kingdom/

Not really. How many times are first time buyers told to reduce their expectations or live somewhere cheaper when they can’t afford home ownership.

Be honest. It’s not the same as being able to afford heat and food. Private school is a luxury.

Do you know the numbers?

I say no such thing to first time buyers. I don’t know where this assumption that shitty comments about taking in ironing and eating avocados etc come from private school parents such that this thread is fair game.

of course it is not the same as not being able to buy food. I find it really odd how people seem to think that unless you’re starving you can’t complain about your own situation in life. Everybody does, and so they should when it comes to their children.

Yeah, just have a cheese sandwich for supper, soon adds up.

I think it’s spiteful but also a shame

And people generally do pay high tax and not begrudge it but this idea we can have a more successful society with wanting more but also despising people, and chiding them I don’t think will work

It’s one thing Blair avoided, successfully imo

What is "the politics of envy"?

Why isn't that called "the politics of equality"?

i didn’t realise that there was data out there which detailed the number of scholarships given across the Uk, the amount given and the financial details of the recipients. Pray share, OP.

The politics of everyone equally poor it should be called. This country is a race to the bottom and full of self loathing losers.

Also happy to pay more income tax to fund services such as NHS and schools.

Great, then we are in agreement. Although I don't understand why you would be opposed to charging private schools VAT.

There are a lot of assumptions on this thread, some of which may not be or are definitely not correct:

• that schools will pass on the whole of the VAT charge to parents, not necessarily true, as some stuff will likely be exempt
• That VAT will in effect be levied on the entire school fee, and on all types of school fees - also not necessarily true, and in the case of specialist school fees pretty unlikely
• that there will be a mass exodus from the independent sector, there is not very strong evidence to support this, school fees have gone up massively in the last two decades but the % of pupils in independents has remained broadly the same
• that any displaced independent sector pupils will cause a ‘massive burden’ on state schools. We don’t know this and estimates of costs and benefits suggest a net gain of more than a billion a year for the treasury.

Love all the (private school) people piling on the OP for being cruel when she's just doing exactly what gets done to posters who cannot make ends meet.

Good on you OP.

I know. It's like the MRAs who are genuinely stumped when a conventionally beautiful woman turns out to be a feminist. Could it be... could it be that you're not actually 'just jealous'? Could it be that you might actually... disagree on principle?