Do you think labour will actually implement 20% vat on school fees?

[labpit]

We have two in Year 7 and year 10 and I am not sure what we will do if this happens. It is a certainty do you think?

How am I being inconsistent?
I’m just saying that paying extra money in fees to some families will mean cuts elsewhere. That those cuts impact other small businesses.
Some people will be priced out completely, some people will make cuts in other areas, some people it won’t impact at all.

Those schools that are charities (and not all are) are obliged to use their resources to further the charitable purpose. They can build up reserves to use for the charitable purpose in the future but they are prohibited from taking a 'profit' and have no shareholders or owner to give profit to. A lot of people on these threads say that (charitable) schools are businesses not charities but this is a fundamental misunderstanding of charity law.

The idea of removing charitable status has already been dropped by Labour and that is unsuprsing as it was an unworkable proposal. If it had there would have been a complex legal mess. Trustees would be obliged to use the charity's assets for the charitable purpose, they couldn't simply convert to being profit making businesses and carry on.

The charitable status point has nothing at all to do with VAT, although politicians keep conflating the two.

It's a complex area and many of the people commenting (especially the politicians promoting it!) don't seem to understand what they are saying.

Has anyone addressed the question as to why nobody who's against this tax is asking why private schools can't increase child/student ratio to cut costs and absorb the VAT, given that they have double the number of teachers per child as the state school average, and given that staffing is schools main cost?

Anyone?

Do you mean increase the child/teacher ratio?

"What do all the other post 16 students do locally? He can't be the only sixth form student for miles around?!"

Yes, apparently he is. 😒

I hope so

"Do you mean increase the child/teacher ratio?" Yup, sorry.

Do you have any thoughts on why this obvious way of cutting costs is being doggedly ignored by parents on this thread with children at fee paying schools, who know that state schools have had to cut costs over a decade of austerity, but for some reason seem to feel this isn't reasonable for private schools, whose fees have increased rapidly over the same period of time.

I’ve not read the whole thread but I think it probably will happen. and then what will happen is the more affluent people will all want to move to areas where the state offer is outstanding and that will drive house prices.l up. So essentially the rich people will still get access to the best schools. Just in a different way.

( to add my children go to an outstanding secondary school, 25 miles down the road where the same house costs at least 200k less , my step kids go to an inadequate school)

money buys good education, whichever way you slice it. This won’t generate any where near the amount of money needed to ‘save’ the majority of state provision.

"It does seem to be an issue that private school parents are concerned that they are paying tax for state education that they do not benefit from"

What makes these people any ethically better than your average Trump supporter who comes out with comments like 'why should I have to pay for someone else's healthcare?' as an argument against universal healthcare. It's an echo of the whole 'there's no such thing as society' Thatcherite nastiness.

Many private schools rely heavily on overseas students so maybe Keir Starmer should look at banning them.
Were this to be done, I guess many private schools would close.

88% of schools are Good or Outstanding. There are plenty of decent schools to go around.

I’m not seeing much grace in the other direction

It’s just I want you to pay more and I don’t care if your dc have to leave their school. At some point people change behaviour and opt out.

I had another thought in this topic today, which nobody seems to have raised.

The vast majority of children who board at private schools, generally have parents serving in the armed forces.

The Government pays 90% of their total bill via the CEA (Continuity of Education) allowance.

Excluding International pupils, most are "Forces Children" making benefit of the CEA scheme who board. If the CEA scheme closed, most independent schools would swiftly follow as boarding fees are significantly higher than day-fees.

The total annual CEA bill is around £80 Million per annum to the taxpayer. If VAT is levied on this, the Government will immediately incur a £16 Million additional cost, every year, to fund this.....before you factor in VAT reclaim of up to 10 years on eligible capital spending made by the schools who could be in for a large rebate from the Government.

Sadly, the politics of "taxing those who have / earn more" do appeal to a large voting base, the same voting base who would scream murder if their income tax was 40% or higher, or they lost their child benefits they are "entitled" to.

That's okay, the minority of us will continue to pick up your tab by paying proportionately more in tax, receiving no "benefits", donating our "entitled" school places for you to squabble over.....and paying into private Health care to free up the NHS queue.

Ironically, I have 1 of our 3 at state school, and it is those parents all sat in new luxury cars, all paid for on PCP, and bragging on social media about their recent holiday. I challenge many of you to be at a typical independent school and most parents drive wrecks, haven't been abroad or had a holiday in years and clothes all seen better days.

My friends who have no children for a variety of reasons may also wonder why they have to pay for education, free childcare, etc.
They don't because they realise they live in a community and are members of society.

@OddSock5 an Ofsted rating means nothing in relation to SEN kids whose needs are not recognised met alone met. The solution to this entire thing is not a quick, vote winning policy of robbing the "rich" but a far more root and branch holistic reform of state education, properly funded and with an acknowledgement that it will take time. Ideally a cross party commitment to a complete overhaul improving workload and conditions to attract new entrants, retain older experienced staff and ultimately emulate the small class sizes and pastoral support offered in private so that those of us who are just barely managing it dont have to. Let the market drive the abolition of that's what you really want. Make them unnecessary. Yes you'll still have the half dozen top ones but short of an actual legal ban and confiscation of property not much to be done about that.

We ALL benefit from state education even if we don’t use it directly. Most of us are state educated. Our doctors, nurses, pilots, plumbers, electricians etc will nearly all have been state educated. We ALL benefit from a society where people are well educated, their health is looked after and we have opportunities to develop. Lockdown showed us just how much we ALL rely on each other.

Well absolutely. I didn’t use the health service in any significant way for the first two decades of my adult life. I demand a tax refund!

It's ridiculous to say that parents of PE children don't benefit from state schooling. We ALL benefit from having an educated population and workforce. Where do you think the vast majority of nurses, doctors, engineers, teachers (including teachers in private schools) etc were educated?

Today I've had my post delivered, I've ordered some groceries, I've used water/electricity/gas. I've filled my car up with fuel. Ive orderred my repeat prescription. The people delivering or managing those services have all been educated somewhere. Probably in the state system. If people weren't educated and couldn't read/write etc then a lot of that everyday stuff couldnt happen.

I'm still not convinced by this mass migration argument. At what house price/stamp duty/legals cost vs how many years of private school VAT at full whack would you need to break even? Particularly in the areas where most private schools are concentrated, and recognising the catchments for these most desirable schools will already have inflated prices... Would thr marginal gain be worth the loss of sport/facilities/playing fields etc?

I'd love to see proper admissions reform alongside other education reforms though.

@JassyRadlett - worth remembering its not just people forced to leave private schools because they can't afford the fees who need to find places - but schools will close in huge numbers displacing even more.

Oh stop it. It’s peanuts. And it’s the old ‘trickle down economics’ lie that the wealthy wheel out every time there is any hint of the playing field being evened out. The inequality in this country is obscene. I say that as someone who is comfortably off. It’s not sour grapes or jealousy. I work with families that are struggling so much and this hand wringing and desperate teaching for ANY possible justification to not fork out a tiny bit more tax is just grotesque. There are people with real problems out there.

Evidence over decades shows that trickle down economics doesn’t work. Unless your aim is to make the wealthy wealthier and the poor poorer.

Social inequality is bad for ALL of us. Crime goes up. Mental health deteriorates. It’s costs society more in the long run.

The numbers needing to leave will be minuscule! It will make zero impact. If Labour get in and this policy goes ahead and I’m wrong, I will come back here and grovel. But there is no way it will be vast numbers. Tiny tiny numbers.

But that's not the argument I was questioning 🙂. It was the i

I guess we'll see on the "huge numbers" - the lobbying is definitely happening hard - but with the primary population already in decline and the secondary population about to follow suit, it might be the saving of some schools. Not saying there might not be localised impacts.

Oh stop it. It’s peanuts

What’s peanuts?

Would you be fine with a similar extra bill, by all means offer it up to where ever, extra tax etc - there’s no doubt people would say yes to your money

I honestly can’t believe the absolute hysteria and hyperbole from people concerned about paying a couple of extra thousand a year. So much illogical catastrophising. It’s ridiculous.

I totally get that for a tiny tiny proportion there will be some genuine concern that they might need to move their kids but the vast majority won’t need to.

I know a couple of friends that would feel it but are professionals where the mother works part time so the money is easily found by doing an extra couple of weeks work a year at most.

If this is a worry for you, then you are already hugely privileged so get some perspective.