AIBU to feel that the ‘Labour against Private Schools’ campaign is a scapegoat for a lack of vision for educational reform?

[BusyMum1978]

2500 UK independent schools with 615K children attending which is 7% of the population of children in FT education up to the age of 16. A number of articles published this week have highlighted the campaign supported by Labour MP’s, who are calling for a number of measures impacting Independent Schools including their complete abolishment, and for these schools to become part of the state school system. A real hatred seems to be forming, and it feels to me like an easy smoke screen to put up rather than the Labour Party providing very specific policies to show how state funded education will be reformed.

I completely understand the feeling behind the imminent appointment of our 20th Etonian PM - there is urgent reform required in politics to have equal representation which I wholeheartedly agree with. I also understand the recently published stats showing accelerated social mobility for those attending top independent schools. I am not saying that there aren’t areas for improvement- but is the objective to bring more children up, or to bring the independently educated 7% down to make it ‘fair’?

My children both attend a prep school, and they are the first generation in both mine and my husband’s family to do so. We aren’t rich, neither of us have a degree, we own one property. We have -and continue to- work hard and made a choice to invest in our children’s education. We know we are privileged to be able to do so. To hear that MP’s want to wage a ‘class war’ with a family like mine feels inflammatory and yet more decisiveness in an already fractured country.

My children started their education in a state primary school but quite honestly it wasn’t good enough, and our heads were turned by what the private sector had to offer.

It equally broke my heart and inspired me to read The Times article on The Willow in Broadwater Farm school. Schools like this desperately need funding and further support, as do a range of children’s services which were cut during austerity. However will abolishing independent schools help a school like this? Parents who have money will still gravitate to the best areas / schools, and get tutors etc. There are a large number of selective state secondary schools that require heavy tutoring to access.

We need to nurture brilliant young minds in this country, to plug the UK skills gap, and compete in a global market. The independent sector has a valuable role to play.

Progress and globalisation is happening at such a rate that it’s becoming a bit uncomfortable. Many jobs our children will do haven’t even been invented yet.

The independent schools could work more closely with the state sector, but it concerns me that this campaign is chasing an ideal, and if successful would just shift the problem elsewhere.

Corbyn ... probably too thick to have grasped the problem exists. He knows who he hates though, right enough. It’s all happening at a pretty basic level in the Corbyn cranium.

They're just saying what they think their target audience want to hear. Hence why they started suggested scrapping tuition fees when they wanted to appeal to younger voters. I don't for one moment think they're thick enough to actually believe half of what they're saying.

Corbyn is always doing his fence sitting and flip-flopping because he can't say what he actually believes - he has to go against his own views to appease the unions.

No, Corbyn is thick. And nasty. He has people around him who are sharper. Also nasty.
The Labour Party is morally and intellectually bankrupt. It’s quite sad, really.

"I note you didn't mention any Labour policitians."

Do you see any Labour politicians talking about elites, whilst having started life in the top socio economic groupings?

@sionnachbeag

Labour's very clear commitment to apply VAT to private school fees would inevitably eliminate a good proportion of existing indepenent schools, which exist financially by the skin of their teeth. The class-war-inspired fallacy is to look at the independent sector throught red-tinted spectacles and see only Eton, when the majority of independent schools are absolutely nothing like it.
labour.org.uk/manifesto/education/

The national debt has not doubled under the Conservatives, as you know very well. In fact, the Conservatives' reduction of the deficit has been achieved in the teeth of hysterical demands from the Left for increased public spending.
fullfact.org/economy/labour-and-conservative-records-national-debt/

Rather than seeking to destroy independent schools, we should be fostering them. In Germany, the state subsidises them, making them available to all...
www.dw.com/en/private-schools-why-does-germany-allow-them/a-46775899-0

...it's called freedom - something that those on the Left find repellant, in their obsessive desire to square every circle in life, whatever the actual, practical cost.

Love people calling Corbyn thick, despite this not being Labour education policy.

Do we have to say it really slowly.

"The Labour Party is morally and intellectually bankrupt. It’s quite sad, really."

Really, the last manifesto was well received and is in line with highly successful policies implemented in social democracies.

"Labour's very clear commitment to apply VAT to private school fees would inevitably eliminate a good proportion of existing indepenent schools, which exist financially by the skin of their teeth"

It probably wouldn't, but unless these institutions can actually be seen to be acting as charities then they need to be taxed accordingly.

"Conservatives' reduction of the deficit has been achieved in the teeth of hysterical demands from the Left for increased public spending."

At great societal cost. Yet the debt has increased, in % terms by 54%, despite the conservatives claims to be "paying down the national debt".

"It's called freedom - something that those on the Left find repellant, in their obsessive desire to square every circle in life, whatever the actual, practical cost."

Meaningless dribble.

You could also reallocate resources from elsewhere without increasing debt or raising taxes. Not sure why that doesn't feature on the list of possibilities for increasing state funding for education.

I’m not calling Corbyn thick because I think this is his policy. I’m calling him thick because he’s thick. I hope putting it in those very precise terms makes the point easier to grasp.
Ps not sure popular support is the right measure of the mans intellectual or moral qualities. Donald trump is quite popular too.

Pages back a PP mentioned Germany insists all children are educated in the system with homeschooling not allowed. The German system also separates into vocational/academic streams at the start of secondary reminiscent of 11+. Not sure that's a road many would want to go down.
www.german-way.com/history-and-culture/education/the-german-school-system/

Yanbu

The German system also separates into vocational/academic streams at the start of secondary reminiscent of 11+. Not sure that's a road many would want to go down.

Yes, I'm aware of that but not sure why it's relevant, I wasn't recommending the German system wholesale. I do think there's no particular reason state education needs to be one-size-fits-all though. No reason you can't have specialist language / music / sports / SEN schools in a properly funded state system.

"Not sure why that doesn't feature on the list of possibilities for increasing state funding for education."

Read the Labour manifesto, it does.

"I’m calling him thick because he’s thick. I hope putting it in those very precise terms makes the point easier to grasp."

Yet your justification for why you think this was meaningless and wasn't based on anything other than your say so.

Righto.

No reason you can't have specialist language / music / sports / SEN schools in a properly funded state system.

Any reason why you didn't include "academic" schools in your plan?

I said before, the current government could make education spending a priority. But the current leadership candidates would like to cut taxes instead.

The equivalent cost is 21% of the schools budget (Johnson) and 30% of the schools budget ( Hunt).

I’m confident that, in the unlikely event mr Corbyn ever submits to an objective test of his intellectual abilities, the conclusions I have drawn based on what he says every single time he opens his silly mouth will be borne out. But you keep sticking up for your twisted little hero. I can see that’s important to you.

"But you keep sticking up for your twisted little hero. I can see that’s important to you."

Wow such an intellectual.

Ad hominem attacks too, classy, shows your ability to criticise actual policy is nil.

No reason you can't have specialist language / music / sports / SEN schools in a properly funded state system

the state do provide specialist music tuition, for parents earning less than 190k, they have to be gifted though.

Normal state schools couldn't attract the specialist teachers at the appropriate level, they wouldn't work in state schools.

I’m confident that, in the unlikely event mr Corbyn ever submits to an objective test of his intellectual abilities, the conclusions I have drawn based on what he says every single time he opens his silly mouth will be borne out

....and Boris Johnson is such an intellectual colossus ? lol! a man who cannot bother reading paragraph 5 C after becoming bewitched by 5 B, wasted millions on a non existent bridge and doesn't care what profession Nazerin Radcliffe does.... what a brain

You sound a bit like the folk who criticize Abbott for her Police numbers howler yet completely ignore/excuse Hammond getting the cost of HS2 wrong by £20 billion.
But it doesn't matter because he is a white male tory......

@sionnachbeag

[Labour's very clear commitment to apply VAT to private school fees] probably wouldn't [force many independent schools to close], but unless these institutions can actually be seen to be acting as charities then they need to be taxed accordingly.

I do assure you, it most certainly would. Every year independent schools close all over the country because they can't make ends meet. The current government's requirement for employers to increase pensions contributions has put the nail in the coffin for many.

"[T]he [national] debt has increased, in % terms by 54%, despite the conservatives claims to be "paying down the national debt".

The Conservatives have reduced the deficit by two-thirds, largely by cutting public spending. The supertanker of British debt is gradually being brought to a halt. Reckless Leftist zealotry would see it at full steam ahead once again.

Meaningless dribble.
Freedom, I do assure you, is not 'meaningless dribble' (or even 'drivel'). The 'small-c'-conservative British people know that well enough, instinctively, to mistrust Corbyn and his Leftist Labour gang.

Oliver’s, are you forgetting about the actual mortgage?

We did the beans on toast thing, got the deposit but didn’t earn enough to actually get the mortgage.

It’s not a problem of frivolity. The average house price where I live is 13 x average salaries. Btw, bank won’t lend 13 x salary in case that wasn’t obvious!

@sionnachbeag brilliant post. Thanks for the links!

I think if the tax rate goes anywhere north of 45% you'll see a lot more emigration of the most educated and high earners. The British can always easily assimilate into other English speaking countries with less taxation and less restriction on education. It's a much easier transition than for those who don't speak English as a first language. You can only tax the net contributors so much before they give you two fingers and go.

" We'll leave the country" always claimed. never happens.

@SlowMoFuckingToes I agree. I wouldn’t want to leave UK but husband works for a global organisation and could do his role from a different country as he manages an EMEA team. There would be a point at which it would be financially attractive for us to move - 20% VAT on schooling plus more tax on his salary. It’s not a threat, but a realistic option which we would explore under those circumstances.

I doubt it, the vast majority of rich people in the UK even under the extreme tax rates of the 50s through to the 70s still stayed here.

Moving countries is hard, loss of family ties, friends, esp your kids ones, the UK way of life.

I lived abroad for 3 years, i earned alot of money but moved back, main reason was i missed the weather seasons! and southern hemisphere countries are pretty isolated and have little historical culture.

Moving abroad just to save a few thousand pounds would be idiotic, tax rates can rise or fall anywhere in the world and if your as wealthy as you say, then vat of school fees should be affordable.