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Abolishing private schools - how would it work in practice?

999 replies

Dongdingdong · 22/09/2019 18:39

Labour has voted to abolish private schools:

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-public-private-school-abolish-eton-vote-conference-corbyn-education-policy-a9115766.html

Whether you agree with this or not, I don’t understand how the logistics would work. Would private schools suddenly cease to exist from say, summer 2023, with all pupils forced to find a place at the local state school for the autumn term onwards? What would happen to the buildings and facilities - would they remain as state schools or be sold off to developers for example? Confused

OP posts:
YobaOljazUwaque · 23/09/2019 08:16

It's a defendable and logical position to be supportive of excellent state education for all which eventually renders private schools obsolete, and voting and campaigning for that aim, whilst simultaneously back in the world as it is here and now choosing that in the absence of such a utopia one might still spend £15k per year on school fees rather than the skiing holidays, gym memberships and other luxuries that one might fritter the money on, if the local options make that the best choice in the current landscape.

In reality changing state schools to provide adequate education is going to take way more money than can be clawed from the rich via VAT on school fees. Per head funding should be at least £10,000 per year to give schools enough staff, equipment and resources. That would cost an extra £50bn per year, which is an average of £1600 per tax payer, an increase of just over 30% on current levels. It would take some quite drastic culture shifts to make that generally acceptable.

You could do it by converting private schools, and all state schools rated as meeting a new "even better than outstanding" rating that means they are everything we could wish for, into something like the direct-grant schools that were abolished in the 70s whereby there are some state places and some fee-paying places but to get a state place you have to opt in irrevocably to a higher-level income tax structure with rates set such that once the majority have opted in, that extra £50bn is available. Government spending can channel funds to state schools until they all meet the standard of excellence that would be the new standard. (And once less than 50% of the population is still on the old tax system that could be phased out.

No of course it wouldn't work.

Meanwhile because schools don't charge vat on the services they provide, they can't (as other businesses can) reclaim the vat they pay on purchases like computers and other equipment. Charities are not exempt from paying VAT like this whereas businesses effectively are, so simply adding VAT to school fees would raise less than you think.

They would have to invent a new non-VAT tax which applies only to private schools of the kind that they want to target (somehow exempting nurseries, home-education with paid tutors, schools specialising in SEN, schools for ballet and dramatic arts and schools for children of military personnel and all the activities of educational charities that aren't schools) so that normal VAT reclamation didn't apply.

God knows what would happen for schools where some pupils come into an "exempted" category and some don't.

Loopytiles · 23/09/2019 08:17

The business case for this would be an expensive one!

ChardonnaysDistantCousin · 23/09/2019 08:22

I won't sacrifice my son for my own conscience.

But you are happy to sacrifice other people’s.

AsTheWorldTurns · 23/09/2019 08:26

It's a defendable and logical position to be supportive of excellent state education for all which eventually renders private schools obsolete, and voting and campaigning for that aim, whilst simultaneously back in the world as it is here and now choosing that in the absence of such a utopia one might still spend £15k per year on school fees rather than the skiing holidays, gym memberships and other luxuries that one might fritter the money on, if the local options make that the best choice in the current landscape.

The problem with your argument here is that it's predicated on the assumption that good state schools render private schools obsolete, which (surprise!) not everyone agrees with.

Even if you were to shut yourself off from the obvious ways in which an idealised state school and its catchment can and would be distorted, we should all be disturbed by the proposed seizure of private assets (note: Labour has also signalled interest in seizing houses vacant for more than six months).

Trewser · 23/09/2019 08:27

How is sending my child to a private school sacrificing anyone's anything? Confused

theyvegotme · 23/09/2019 08:28

@ChardonnaysDistantCousin

There is no logical connection there.

AsTheWorldTurns · 23/09/2019 08:28

Spot on Chardonnay.

Trewser · 23/09/2019 08:30

Yes, a state school being good or excellent doesn't mean people won't still want or require private education.

Our local state is good, lots of nice kids doing well. But the private I have chosen is better.

Trewser · 23/09/2019 08:31

Better for us. Also there is just no way, seeing how much thw state school parents kicked off over uniform and discipline sanctions, that a state school could ever be as good as a good private school.

LaPeste · 23/09/2019 08:35

The defenders of private schools often seem to making an argument along the lines of "It's impractical to abolish racism, and plus, I'm white, so I benefit from it".

ChardonnaysDistantCousin · 23/09/2019 08:36

The defenders of private schools often seem to making an argument along the lines of "It's impractical to abolish racism, and plus, I'm white, so I benefit from it".

Can you please link to where this has been said?

AsTheWorldTurns · 23/09/2019 08:37

The defenders of private schools often seem to making an argument along the lines of "It's impractical to abolish racism, and plus, I'm white, so I benefit from it".

Yes, it's exactly like that. Wink

Trewser · 23/09/2019 08:38

Jealousy is a terrible thing!

Figmentofmyimagination · 23/09/2019 08:38

I guess you just start feeding in state funded children from year 7 and adopt academy status. The existing pupils could really luck up in this scenario as their school intake will remain selectively sourced for a long time but they won’t have to pay any fees.

Quite a few of the existing schools began life as direct grant state-funded grammars, so for them, it’s not that radical a change - from private to public. The real issue will be the selection, not the payment.

Grammar schools and some free schools will enjoy a resurgence if there is any threat to school ‘quality’. It was the demise of the grammar school that led to the relative success of many minor public schools. When there was still a grammar school in every town, private schools were used by the wealthy of a way of escaping the secondary modern.

Davros · 23/09/2019 08:39

Let's start with this
humanism.org.uk/campaigns/schools-and-education/faith-schools/

Camomila · 23/09/2019 08:39

There's more faith and grammar schools than private schools though? Grammar schools I suppose would be fairly easy to convert but isn't the land/buildings of lots of faith schools owned by the church?

I think the easiest option would just be giving a lot more funding to state schools tbh. Maybe a lottery system for secondary schools in cities? (so the DC are old enough to get themselves there)

ChardonnaysDistantCousin · 23/09/2019 08:39

Honestly, those that make comparisons with communism are a daft as brush

This is what you said earlier, LaPeste.

Can you explain how abolishing something and re-distributing their assets in the name of class war is different to communism?

theyvegotme · 23/09/2019 08:40

I do agree that faith schools should not be state funded.

ChardonnaysDistantCousin · 23/09/2019 08:42

Grammar schools and some free schools will enjoy a resurgence if there is any threat to school ‘quality

What you are missing here is that Labour wants to abolish Ofsted as well, so there won't be any more school rankings. It will be done by the local authorities, which would suggest there won't be centralised ranking system.

They they all will be equal.

AsTheWorldTurns · 23/09/2019 08:44

The real issue will be the selection, not the payment.

The issue is both.

Payment - who pays, exactly?

And of course, the most important question of the day. Who gets to go to the newly nationalised Eton? Certainly not the current crop of Etonians, they'd be off to Switzerland like a shot.

How do they select? I would guess that Corbyn would want to scour the country find the least able, most badly behaved cohort, but more realistically, it would be the leafy confines of Eton, Datchet, and Windsor.

And so, I guess the surrounding housing market would heat?

Figmentofmyimagination · 23/09/2019 08:45

There is an analogy - sort of - with the NHS in 1949+ - it was being drawn by a labour politician on the radio this morning - but the biggest difference is that the customer base - fee paying patients - were mostly in favour of the state taking over medical care. It was the doctors who resisted - many understandably opposed nationalisation of health vociferously, as a threat to their businesses and livelihoods and an assault on their professional autonomy.

You really can’t imagine the NHS being created today!

BentBastard · 23/09/2019 08:46

Presumably they would have to phase something like this in? They can't be proposing kicking kids out of their school mid GCSE or A Level to a school that may not even run the same syllabus?

AsTheWorldTurns · 23/09/2019 08:47

They they all will be equal.

Grin
Camomila · 23/09/2019 08:48

DS will (hopefully) be going to a Catholic primary school next year...hopefully the fees would be cheap like Italian or American church schools!

LaPeste · 23/09/2019 08:48

Can you explain how abolishing something and re-distributing their assets in the name of class war is different to communism?

Yes, it's a question of degrees. The government takes and distributes assets all the time, in the form of taxation. Is that communism? When the NHS was founded, private assets were taken into public ownership. Was that communism? Communism was a little more expansive than what is being proposed here.

By all means, argue that the proposals are impractical (I haven't seen then in detail), but calling them communism just looks silly.

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