VAT on private school fees - will it change how you vote?

[Iwishicouldflyhigh]

Following on from the other interesting thread about whether it will be implemented, will this policy change how you vote either way?
For me - i've voted Labour and Tory over the years, but Tory for the most recent GE's. This year, i've been thinking seriously about how i'd vote at the next GE and it wasn't definitely a Tory vote - i was definitely a floating voter.
However, my children are at PS and so i will now most definitely be voting Tory (not just because how the VAT will seriously impact us - child number 3 will now not be going to the prep that we had lined up for her, she'll enter the local primary until secondary school - but how i think that it will affect schools negatively and children negatively).
I have a lot of left leaning friends who educate privately and whilst they cannot bring themselves to vote Tory, they won't vote Labour either at the next GE because of this policy.

It seems to me that this policy is only a vote loser (ie many Labour voters and 'floaters' who school privately won't vote for them at the next GE) and not a vote winner (ie i can't imagine that many Tory or 'floaters' will vote for Labour solely on this policy).

AiBU to think that Labour have really shot themselves in the foot with this idea?

This is an interesting read:

https://thecritic.co.uk/is-charging-vat-on-private-schools-a-vote-loser/

The greens can have any policy they want they’ll never have to implement it so don’t have to consider how it works in practise

Interesting that the age group least supportive of the policy are young adults, whereas the most supportive are middle-aged.

But do you not realise that a huge factor in why your child would not be supported in a state school (not even necessarily mainstream) is the policies of the current government?

The Tories have underfunded councils and healthcare for years. Voting Tory will mean the masses suffer so I’m not able to, on balance, find much sympathy for those stretching themselves to privately educate. I feel for the families affected but not as much as a feel for the patients on long waiting lists for surgery or those losing jobs right now (26% of my local council will lose their jobs in the next 6 months) etc.

Dont be so insulting!!! If you are paying 60k/year for school then you most definitely are rich. That is near enough3x the NMW!!!

People with £60k a year who don’t realise they are rich is such a contrast to the thread where the majority of people can’t even save £100 a month! How can you be so delusional and removed from reality. It’s like buying a brand new Ferrari and wiping out your savings then claiming to be poor.

Vat should be paid by private schools ! Long overdue

Continuing underfunding for NHS, social care chaos, financial crisis for teaching - or vote to save a few thousand a year on private school fee's?

The estimate, even if it is bought in, is for fee's to rise about 10%. I'm sorry, but if you can afford £40k, or £80k a year to privately educate 2 children, then paying £44k, or £88k really isn't going to make you end up at the food bank.

For the many?? I would definitely vote Tory if I were you because you obviously only really care about what happens to you.

I must say the cost of school fees in some areas is astonishing! The fees near us are approx £15k per year for secondary and less for younger years. 😳 It's clear there is a north/south divide in the cost of private education. Interestingly most of the best regarded state schools are also in the South.

I'm still waiting to see any evidence that this will achieve any "levelling up". Levelling down perhaps.

From an exhausted teacher who attempts to deliver outstanding lessons on a shoestring, ANY funds directed into state school budgets will be more than what we have currently and I’m all for that.

I don't believe in private education full stop so it wont change my vote. I think it's probably quite a narrow section of people who it would impact (plenty can still afford, majority it is out of reach even without VAT charged).

Yep, this policy is just nasty & is being used by Labour to mask the fact they will not spend a penny more than the Tories on education - not to mention not spending anymore on NHS or other public services ...and did I mention they are also now supportive of Boris' hard brexit.
It'll be the Lib-dems for me now, much more likely to tax unearned income & wealth rather than disrupting kids education

The IFS has said should raise 1.5 to 1.7bn.

To be spent on the most under privileged children.

Or we can rely on "Trickle down" economics which has served us oh so well.

Whats nasty about expecting the nations richest families to pay a very small amount of extra tax (in terms of their overall income)

How much is too much tax? It is all well and good demanding more and more from higher earners however there comes a point where you create a disincentive to earn more.

I pay 62% tax on some of my salary and in return don’t receive a single penny back and never have done. No child benefit, no 30 hours nursery, no tax free personal allowance, excluded from tax free childcare savings scheme. The list is endless.

I’m now being told that apparently I don’t pay enough and should stump up thousands extra for VAT. I’d love to know how much tax people think is reasonable to pay on salaries of:

50k
100k
200k

Remember at each level you are at or near to losing at least one type of benefit whether that be child benefit, personal tax allowance, funded childcare hours, tax free interest on savings or pension taper.

Because if you want to tax the richest families in the country, you should be taxing wealth (asset appreciation, inter-generational, gifting etc), unearned income (equalising dividend tax) carried interest etc, city transaction tax etc ....not seeking to blame "rich kids" (pejoratively nasty) when the ones who are to likely to go through significant disruption e.g. bursaries, SEN etc are usually far from rich....and did I mention Labour havnt committed to spending a single penny more on education ....its just a divisive smokescreen
And I spend money on music lessons, swimming clubs & go through a church school - oh the hypocrisy..... to give my kids advantages? You betcha ar*e! And if they applied tax to my kids opportunities I would be equally appalled

I send my kids to state schools but Dh and I work in private schools. My school is planning on the basis that labour will get in and will implement this policy. I hope it won’t affect my job but I will vote Labour. I disagree with Labour re TWAW too but they are vastly the better of the main two options and I’m in a solid labour area with a good MP so it’s an easy decision for me. I wish all schools were as well funded as the ones Dh and I work in.

@Charlie2121

Its never enough for people like that. They are a bottomless pit of need.

You can't fix that mentality.

Even explaining how taxes work and how these policies actually hurt public services would just go over their head because they don't wan to listen and learn.

They are angry about life and just want to hurt "the people above them" who they see as "having so much".

It was the same with the Brexit referendum with wanting to "give the rich folks in the south a good kicking"

You cannot reason with people like that.

It’ll come back to bite though

No won’t change my vote in that I don’t know who to do vote for, but it does mean I’m applying for an echp for my disabled child on the basis they need to be in a small independent school (could not cope in a class of 30) (with a full time nurse on site) (opinion of NHS paediatrician and clinical psychologist who have written to support ehcp).

I don’t see why I should pay VAT for something my child has to have. (Before anyone says vat won’t be payable for disabled children, Labour have been clear unless school place is fully funded under an ehcp then vat will apply on fees. I’m in various social media groups and lots of neurodiverse parents now applying. Yes, many won’t get fees funded (to escape vat), but many will get personal budgets for therapies they currently pay for so they won’t be worse off).

I don't understand this. When you vote do you not think about what would benefit the rest of society and the people who are struggling most? This seems like such a selfish mindset to have.

13 years of Tory rule and Brexit suggests that a great many people don't give the most vulnerable in society a second thought when casting their vote.

As a family we are almost certainly financially better off under a Tory government but there is no way I could ever bring myself to vote for them.

@EasternStandard

I agree with you. And those same people will then blame you for not warning them when their life gets worse due to their own poor choices.

Lack of education & critical thinking skills leads to exactly these outcomes.

This is really hard to teach and adding VAT to fees won't even touch the sides of public investment that is required to improve public education in the UK. For that you need a sustained £10bn extra/year for 10+ years, and not the c£0.7bn/year this silly VAT add-on will give the public purse. Its not even ring-fenced for education either (which the crowd on here keeps ignoring).

Thats not a plan. It is a profound lack of a plan designed to elicit strong responses in their base for short-term electoral reasons.

And what we are actually talking about here is improving things for future generations. The ones posting in this thread with non-existent understanding of public finance and taxes are too old for any measurable improvement. Its all ideology and biases with them. Nothing gets through to them. Nothing.

And thats where we are. The politics of envy have become corrosive in the UK, and it is now self-sustaining and making the country increasingly poorer.