to think the state should pay part of our private school fees?

[wolvesarejustoldendaydogs]

Don't jump down my throat! It's just a thought.

State schools are overcrowded and there aren't enough good ones. Private schools are expensive.

What if every child had a right to have their state school 'payment' (whatever it costs per child per year') paid to a private school? Obviously parents would have to top-up (probably a considerable amount).

That would create a bit of a market, with more choice, making private schools more affordable and state ones less overcrowded.

Or is it a stupid idea for a reason I will think of soon after pressing 'POST'?

If funding was given the outcome would be a rise in fees.

Outraged - I do not understand 'These are still children that deserve an education!' - who has said they do not? If you mean children in the private education system - they would get 'an education' in the state system but their parents choose to pay for an eduction instead. As far as charitable status for private schools obviously there are funded places offered to scholarship children, but still they are not exactly looking after the most vulnerable children.

I would be more impressed if 'looked after' children were given boarding places in top private schools instead of floundering in underfunded state provision.

Sunnydelight it's not "government money", it comes from taxpayers. Think of the most shit district in your bit of Australia. A battler is paying for your child to be educated. Not right. Not right at all.

Sorry. I see you don't give a shit.

Didn't the Tories talk about a voucher scheme a few years ago? I'm sure they dropped the idea as, in the end, it was thought it would be a vote loser.

Put it this way OP, a lot of countries that are trouncing us internationally - such as Germany - have a very strong state education system. DP comes from a country where they have a strong state sector and a) was hard-pushed to name a private school in his home country (apart from religious-based) and b) was totally bemused at the idea of paying for something that, in his home country, is free and excellent.

State-funded doesn't mean low quality and, as a product of state education, I resent the implication it does. A lot of the teachers, doctors, dentists etc. who staff the private sector in this country trained in the state sector and I don't think that has made a blind bit of difference to their output. The last thing I would stop and ask someone before they treated me is 'What school did you go to?'.

Also, the idea that forcing everyone to go to state schools would lower our international competitiveness ignores the fact that all the 'brilliant' teachers and students from places like Eton etc. (just for one second pretending that they are somehow 'better' than state people) would be in the state system so the outcome would be the same for them but better for the poorer students who would otherwise have seen resources draining away. Our competitiveness could improve as those students are given more chances to reach their potential.

What a great idea!
Steal money from already struggling state schools so a handful of children can get a 'better' education.

bigmouth my understanding of take up of scholarships in the UK is that they are not from bright working class kids, but from what Orwell called the "shabby genteel". You're so right about the "looked after".

YABU - everyone can choose to go to state school, not everyone can choose to go private (even if the state did fund some of it). So why should the taxes fund something that would not be an option for everyone.

YY Heidihole - I think the reason we agree differs as I do not think the state should part fund private education in theory or in practice while you see the impracticality but sympathise idealogically. Unless I am reading your post wrong. Which is entirely possible of course.

When I was at private school about 35 years ago my school got some money from Govt that kept fees manageeble for my parents. I think it was called 'grant maintained'. Then that grant was suddenly removed half way through my secondary school years and my parents really struggled to pay the fees. It was only a very basic boarding school - not an Eton or Harrow.

I can't remember the exact details but in effect, the govt grant money was a sort of recognition of the fact that parents were not using the state system.

I think that every parent should get a voucher so that they can vote with their own money where to spend it. Bad state schools woud fold, good state schools would get more resources and could expand, cheaper forms of private schools partly staffed by parents would start up and existing private schools would be more accesisble to lower income families.

A voucher scheme might just work better than what we have now with parents either paying over the odds for tutors to get DCs through 11+ or to buy a house in the catchment area of better state school or struggling to pay private school fees or forced into home educating or just accepting their DCs have no choice but a rubbish state school.

Vouchers would eventually create more real choice for parents.

The state do already part fund private school reception class.

Children upto 5 are entitled to 15 hours free education a week for 38 weeks a year.

We were able to claim this for DD until the term after she was 5 and it came off the school fees. Summer borns got the funding for the whole of reception year.

Were also able to pay the fees with childcare salary sacrifice vouchers (computershare) until she was legal school age - (April after she turned 5 in the January)

The govenant has introduced free schools which are open to all children. There is nothing to stop a private school applying to become a state funded free school. Infact some private schools have become free schools.

I think its right the governant has stopped schools from being able to charge top ups. State schools are well funded in the UK compared with many countries. Many state schools have excellent after school provision.

The Australian system is not blinkin perfect either. My friend's child is in an Australian school that is semi private i.e. some state funding and some of it funded by her. She spends a fortune on books and materials for her child which she is happy to do but her daughter is only in reception and she is astounded by what she is expected to provide. As it only semi privately funded the parents have to help the school and only have limited choice in what they are expected to do. Again she is happy to help the school but she is heavily pregnant and has already been told she has to take the reception/kindergarten washing home weekly (towels, art aprons etc). She has had to do a talk to her daughters class about her profession. She has had to go in and act as a parent support. All this is non negotiable at the school her daughter is at. Her daughter only started there in January so she has had to do an awful lot already.

... and another thing. The tax break private schools get only allows them to escape paying VAT. They don't make a profit so they would have no income tax to pay anyway.

State schools don't pay VAT or income tax either so private schools just have the same tax status as state schools. Private schools don't get any advantage over state schools by being charities.

Yabu. I suggest that state schools are given £15000 a year per pupil for a government term and then we can actually see if private schools are dramatically better than state based on everyone getting similar funding.

It is not right to suggest the poorest subsidise the middle classes in order for the middle classes to gain a further advantage over them. You already have so much, why do you need to take more?

Morebeta How are parents choosing, exactly?

What school, fuck the vouchers, will choose the SN over the gifted and talented, the compliant over the attitudinally challenged? ( Apologies right away to the parents of the gifted and talented SN students - I'm making a broad point here)

While all these these school, are folding and opening in some hideous origami-like fashion, what happens to the punters, sorry, children?

Maybe the fairest way would be for parents to be given a 'means tested' voucher so the very poorest get £15k vouchers and the very rich get nothing.

Actually, that is how university education used to be funded and despite being privately educated my parents had so little income that I got a full student grant and came out with no debt.

echt - surely some schools will no doubt open especially to cater for SN and many parents will actively choose them or even set them up if they know funding is there via vouchers.

The tax system shouldn't be about getting out the same as you pay in.
It should be about everyone having equal access to facilities that meet their needs. If you choose not to use those facilities then you should pay for the alternative in full.
I'm NOT saying that the current situation lives up to the ideal, but IMO that's what we should be aiming at, and part-funding private school places moves away from it, not toward it.

Private schools have a lot of frills which aren't basic education. Children have amazing opportunites which if they were bought outside a school you would have to pay vat on. For example a state school family might have to join a private gym or pay for music lessons or buy an expensive computer to give similar opportunites.

I think that if private schools had vouchers they would just put up their fees.

"It would be like the nursery vouchers scheme. Nobody seems to mind people using them in private nurseries."

Private nurseries aren't allowed to charge top up fees and they are supposed to allow the child to just do their 15 hours. I have no idea how this works in a private reception class.

Morebeta am laughing at your last post. You haven't suggested special funding to be attached to SN vouchers, so how would that work?

Love the uni bit. Not.
For myself, despite being raised in relative poverty, and state-educated, my parents earned so much income with my dad as a bus conductor, that they had to top up my grant. If you lived in a council house you couldn't set it against the grant as you could a mortgage, so the working -class get fucked. Again.

Margaret Thatcher was going to issue school vouchers in the 80s when I was at private school. My Mum still goes on about it that she rescinded her promise