To wonder how one would go about abolishing private schools?

[Chuffin]

If anyone is following the @abolisheton campaign, they state their aim is to integrate private schools into the public sector and hope this to be included in Labours next manifesto.

My children are about to start independent school, having had a terrible time for a whole host of reasons in their state primary.

Aside from the moral argument for or against private schools, I am very interested in whether it would be legally possible to abolish private schools and how this would happen? Would this even be feasible realistically?

Someone upthread has suggested that independent school parents would plough a proportion of the fees they currently pay into whichever state school their children would go to instead.

This might happen ... but there’s a good chance that it won’t. If the majority of parents pay nothing, I’d be amazed if more than a couple choose to pay £1k / £2k / £5k so the school gets a new science lab etc. The thing with independent school fees is that everyone (unless on a bursary) pays.

If independent school parents were forced to send their children to state schools, many will also arrange after school tutoring (in face I know quite a few people who have done this). So these children may still have an advantage.

If affluent parents had only state schools to attend, then they could use part of the £15 per annum they currently spend in fees to plough into schools which don't have that kind of support. Standards and opportunities would go up across the board, and they would reflect accurately each child's skills

I’m presuming you mean £15k per annum? If so (a) we spent nowhere near that per annum and (b) no way in hell would I have put any money into a school that wasn’t of my “choosing”. I would simply have home educated our daughter.

I think the whole idea is a terrible one. Rather than abolish private schools, all party’s should pledge to make a concerted effort to improve spending and quality of provision in the state sector.

For the most part, if state schools offered exactly the same level of opportunities (in all Aspects- academic, sports, music/arts and extra-curricular) then most parents would have choice and children access to an excellent education. Many parents would not then chose independent school for their children. Of course, some parents chose independent schools for social reasons, or snobbery etc, but most don’t.

Abolishing private schools wouldn’t level the playing field all that much in my view. The wealthy will be able to buy their way into the best catchment areas/get in tutors/support extra-curricular activities. And the really wealthy will just use their equivalents elsewhere. But the corbynites will have made a paper victory that helps no-one. It’s all about ideology.

I despair really- hate what the Tories are doing re Brexit and thought of PM Johnstone makes me cringe. This labour lot are no better, just terrible in different ways! Corbyn would be a disaster for this country as PM too. Lib Dem’s I’m just not sure about. I feel I don’t have a party that represent me.

This might happen ... but there’s a good chance that it won’t

I think it’s extremely unlikely that it will happen.
There are a number of posters on mumsnet who say they send their children to state school because they want to stick to their principles even though they could afford to educate them privately. I wonder how many of them donate to their children’s school the equivalent of the fees which they could so easily afford.

@TeenTimesTwo they are already trying to remove charitable status and it’s looking highly likely to happen soon.

Wasrelaxing - A pp has explained (though possibly on another similar thread to this) why it will be difficult to achieve this.
Are you saying the Tory government will do it or it will happen if Labour win the next election ?
How do you think they will achieve this (genuine question)

And will we also be banning other forms of choice? What about private healthcare- after all, that allows those with money to buy access to healthcare (not necessarily better, but certainly quicker and with your choice of HCP and location). Or private tutors? There are a multitude of things which having a larger income gives more choice/advantage- where does the interference/removal of choice stop “?

Duffield who will decide and on what grounds which children go to the ex private school with its fabulous facilities and which to the state school with less good facilities?

This is a private school within 10 miles of where I live

www.lancingcollege.co.uk/

Does anyone really think that these buildings would be preserved as state schools? Or that the state even has spare the sort of money needed to run it as a state school?
It cost around £25k pa as a day pupil and even more to board.

Then if you turn it into state not everyone in the area will be able to go so who chooses. Other schools could use their facilities but that already happens as one of my son had his school swimming lessons there. The pool was given for free and all we paid was the coach hire each week.

Duffeldaisy you assume that all private school parents pay full fees and are affluent. That's not true.

You are forgetting the children who are at private schools on scholarships and bursaries. They ensure that the very privileged have contact with children from disadvantaged homes.

You need to improve the state system before you can even talk of abolishing the private system, otherwise you really do create a super-elite class that no-one else ever mixes with.

The goal should be to bring up all schools to the standard of private schools, not drag them all down.

I don't think this will happen as won't religious schools that IMHO are incredibly segregating.

Maybe Momentum can emulate ISIS at Palmyra and destroy the citadels of English education.

Just imagine a bunch of moronic middle class left wing Corbynites trampling and bulldozing Eton, Harrow, Wycombe Abbey and that country pile near Tunbridge Wells.

Tear them down and expunge centuries of academic excellence and dismiss everything the public school system has given to this country.

Finally improving the education of the masses is nothing to do with this, rather to stop any child questioning the orthodoxy of socialist thinking.

@Marriageoffigaro
@bananaskinsnomnon
@helenluvsrob

Your charitable private schools ARE ROBBING state schools. NOT 'removing financial burden' (@Marriageoffigaro)

For each £100 donated to a school with charitable status, its accountants will go to the public coffer and demand another £25. Higher-rate taxpayers can then claim back £25 in their self-assessments. Additional-rate payers can ask for £31.25. This means that every £100 given to charity by a basic-rate taxpayer will cost the Treasury £25, £100 given by a 40 per cent taxpayer costs £50, and the same amount from an additional rate taxpayer, costs £56.25. If, for example, Jeff Fairburn, the newly super-rich chief executive of housebuilder Persimmon, hands over £10m of his bonus to charity, his gift will (assuming it would all attract tax at 45 per cent) cost the Treasury — and hence the rest of us — £5.65m. A good 99 per cent of the organisations with charitable status in the UK should have it removed The phrase “Gift Aid” somehow suggests there is free money available. There is not. If Mr Fairburn gave his £10m to his favourite private school, the rest of us would instantly be down the equivalent of 100-odd primary school teachers for a year. The more goes in Gift Aid, the less there is left for public services. Add in other state subsidies offered to official charities (business rates relief, VAT relief, exemptions from capital gains and dividend taxes) and the money redirected from the state to registered charities starts to add up: the subsidisation of the charitable sector in the UK costs well over £6bn a year.

(taken from an article from the Financial Times by Merryn Somerset WebbFEBRUARY 24, 2018)

The goal should be to bring up all schools to the standard of private schools

If every pupil, at every school, attracted the amount of money a private school receives in fees for their education, as well as removing all children with needs related to social deprivation, and virtually all children with SEN affecting behaviour (not to mention all children with parents uninterested in education), then that might be possible....

Is anyone up for that?

and virtually all children with SEN affecting behaviour (not to mention all children with parents uninterested in education), then that might be possible

DD’s private prep didn’t do that. In fact it has been building a formidable reputation for its commitment to pupils with SEN. In DD’s class alone over 50% had some form of SEN.

Which is why I specified those affecting behaviour.

How many of these children have diagnoses that come within the BESD (behavioral, emotional and social difficulties) category? How many present with very challenging behaviour?

How many of these children have diagnoses that come within the BESD (behavioral, emotional and social difficulties) category? How many present with very challenging behaviour?

In DD’s class 4 out of the 10 with SEN came under those categories. 3 out of those 4 came from state schools that had utterly failed them.

Further down the school are similar ratios in the classes I have contact with.

I know that there are private schools that 'manage out' children with ANY form of SEN (I work in a school which 'catches' many of those managed out in this way locally).

However, I also know that there are private schools who do admit and work with children with dyslexia, dyspraxia, dysgraphia, dyscalxculia, well-managed / medicated ADHD, mild autism, mild learning difficulties, sensory impairments suich as deafness or blindness, and some physical difficulties (especially prep / primary schools, which do not live and die by their GCSE / A level results)

On the other hand, I know of no private schools who admit and retain children with very challenging behaviour, nor with moderate or greater learning difficulties.

On the other hand, I know of no private schools who admit and retain children with very challenging behaviour, nor with moderate or greater learning difficulties

Well there you go. I’m sure you’re not suggesting because you don’t know of one they don’t exist...?

My DS looked round an indeoendent school that only took children with violent challenging behavior. Not the right place for him - he wasnt that severe but the most likely school for his SEN is independent. No schools in the maintained sector could meet his needs. The LA is now only approaching independents.

Ds was diagnosed with ASD at two. He has been educated exclusively in the private sector. The LEA would not let us run his programme of support - although later, at SENDIST, conceded it was the right provision. Ds is heading for a public school we hope on a music scholarship.
We were right, the state was wrong - we had to go private to do what ds needed. I dread to think what a hash the state would have made of things. That shouldn’t be, of course; the point of this is to challenge the myth that the independent sector washes its hands of SN.

...Copy and paste didn't work last time. Let's hope this makes more sense.

Schools with charitable status ARE IMPOVERISHING state schools!

For each £100 donated to a private school with charitable status, its accountants will go to the public coffer (tax payers) and demand up to another £31.25 (Additional-rate payers).

This means that every £100 given to charity by a basic-rate taxpayer will cost the Treasury £25, £100 given by a 40 per cent taxpayer costs £50, and the same amount from an additional rate taxpayer, costs £56.25.

If, for example, Jeff Fairburn, the newly super-rich chief executive of housebuilder Persimmon, hands over £10m of his bonus to a private school with charitable status, his gift will (assuming it would all attract tax at 45 per cent) cost the Treasury — and hence the rest of us — £5.65m.

The phrase “Gift Aid” somehow suggests there is free money available. There is not.
If Mr Fairburn gave his £10m to his favourite private school, the rest of us would instantly be down the equivalent of 100-odd primary school teachers for a year. The more goes in Gift Aid, the less there is left for public services.

Add in other state subsidies offered to official charities (business rates relief, VAT relief, exemptions from capital gains and dividend taxes) and the money redirected from the state to registered charities starts to add up: the subsidisation of the charitable sector in the UK costs well over £6bn a year.

(edited but taken from an article from the Financial Times by Merryn Somerset Webb - FEBRUARY 24, 2018)

Agh, OK, I can see that I'm causing confusion here.

I know that there are independent special schools - so schools which are not state funded (though some children will be placed there and paid for through state SEN funding) but have the same role as state run special schools, ie to specifically cater for children with either one, or a range of, special needs.

There are also schools that have a particular specialism, though they also cater for children without SEN - for example I know of a local private school with a dyslexia specialist unit, and I know that there are particular schools recommended on here elsewhere in the country who are known to cater particularly well for children with particular SEN alongside others.

Let me be clear that I am not talking about these.

I am talking about the vast majority of 'mainstream' academic private schools.

The phrase “Gift Aid” somehow suggests there is free money available. There is not.

I mentioned upthread, gift aid should be abolished. Its weird, some people really don't seem to realise the money they cheerfully bestow in addition to their donation or entrance fee is coming out of taxes and therefore isn't being used for the common good. We had quite a discussion with others in the queue for Ely cathedral recently, after which afaik no one within earshot chose to do it.

Unless you're absolutely convinced the charity (some of which really don't deserve that status) is going to do something more useful than funding education or the nhs, then say no to requests for gift aid.

I see the old bursary argument came up again, but even the private school cheerleaders the ISC say no more then 1% get a totally free ride.
Is that 6500 kids then, our closest 5 schools cater for 7000 kids, so only 5 more schools needed to cover those.

Many on here seem to argue that you would lose the specialist schools, but many of these are already nearly state schools anyway.
There is a school, which we use to live next to on outskirts of Hull, it's fees make Eton and Winchester look like state school funding in comparison. £150000 per annum. But all fees are paid by the state and all pupils are ex state pupils. It is a PRU.
on top of our 3 local special schools plus a new free school for disabilities opening next year, there are 2 special schools and again all pupils fees are paid by their LEAs.
One of our bridesmaids Dc goes to Chethams school of music, it is paid for mainly by government finances, I noticed their head teacher moaning it wasn't fair their fees where subject to the spending freeze as state schools. So already virtual state schools.

Mumsnet is an eye opener, look at the education threads and the arguments between Eton, Westminster, Winchester Tonbridge Harrow parents about which is best. Or the language used to describe state schools and their pupils (my DC).
On the other AIBU thread about this, people say about not sacrificing their kids, as it well known that SM schools choose a daily pupil to be kill at the altar of Ofsted to get a better rating.
All comps are hell holes with knives/drugs/childhood pregnancies etc( you pick), funny enough ours isn't.
Private school users regularly say similar in real life, I wouldn't dream of saying your school is full of posh arses and drugs.

2BoysandaCairn

For someone who is allegedly totally happy with your educational decisions, you’re incredibly defensive....