To think that people who agree with VAT on private school fees but not on university fees, are hypocrites?

[Blanket601]

If Labour add VAT to private school fees, they should also add VAT to university fees. Or no VAT on either. The principle and rule, should be the same.

Why is only private school education being platformed. I think we all know why.

This is like arguing that a typewriter is better than a PC in the 80s because they are more available and cheaper and easier to repair.

Ok your not in a position to buy a EV yet, it doesn't mean that as not every one can afford one, that they should be taxed to penalize those who can this is really levelling down economics.

Let's tax new cancer treatments because only a few can afford them... Super smart when in 25 years they will be generic and there will be wide spread low cost access. If you destroy the demand through taxation of every innovation there will never be any advancement and we will all be equally poor for it.

The NHS does have to pay VAT on cancer treatments.

That's a pretty funny example as due to the split of the government budget it's almost impossible to be a net contributor to Vat.

Are you forgetting those people are paying into taxes that your children are benefitting from in a state system? You seem confused about funding and how it works. People are not propping up private school parents. The private school is a business and they get vat privileges. That means it will be put onto the business. That doesn't affect you. Your child is not suddenly going to become a great brainy success because of the £5 per head more that will happen. Absolutely misguided.

Let’s not forget officially Universities as deemed by the Government are Private as well.
Once a tax on education is deemed acceptable it is deemed acceptable for all private institutions. With growing debt amongst former University students unable to pay back their full student loans it is very feasible to expect Universities to pay tax as well to pick up the cost to the tax payer.

This growing debt is presumably why Sunak is looking at Uni. courses that are thought to be not financially viable ( something I don’t agree with btw )

Universities to pay tax as well to pick up the cost to the tax payer.

Can I check what you mean by this? Universities pay lots of tax. If we were to put VAT on student fees they would be able to reclaim more of their input VAT so it would effectively reduce the tax they paid. The hypothetical new VAT would be paid by the student (or more likely, would be notionally paid by the state in the form of a loan and then add to the number of students that never pay it back).

Education in all forms is exempt from tax.
Adding tax will increase fees.
However in order to balance the books that £ won’t be just farmed out to students and even the % that might be won’t necessarily mean Student Loans increase at all. That means more students will have to find more money from somewhere potentially pushing out kids whose parents can’t support them.

Then there’s the rest of the £% for Universities to find
Cutting certain courses with a low uptake for example

Exactly. It’s not looking good for universities.

Potential VAT could be added onto fees.

This increase can’t really continue to be covered by student loans alone - the tax payer pays these. Many students atm just never pay it back. It can’t go on.

Uni fees will be going up without a doubt, very soon.

Further unis / courses will have to close.

Private schools with VAT added, excluding many that were just managing / could just manage in future.

All of this tells us that both private schools and universities, will become more exclusive to the people that can afford them. Going back in time basically.

Why would it effect total fees students pay though? The government stipulate the fee. They could easily lower the amount uninversitiex charge students so that when VAT is added the total fee is the same as before.

Possibly. But when ‘the gvt pays’ - that means the tax payer pays. So why should the tax payer pay more to exclude university students from paying VAT on their education?

Most (all?) University courses now make a loss on teaching home undergraduates. The fee has been frozen whilst costs have soared. The sector is already at risk of imploding. They could not teach home UG on a lower fee.

Back to pre University grants probably ie 1962

The tax payer won't be paying more. If money was received via VAT it could just be paid back. Student fees are already supplemented to some extent. Total waste of time of course to take money and give it back but if universities had to pay VAT that is what would happen

Surely if you want to raise money for education then one angle is that the university takes responsibility for its loan book.

If they turn out thousands of graduates with a degree in "artist qualities of smelly socks" who then have incomes lower than the repayment threshold then this is unlikely to be a sustainable system.

The tax payer and students are getting mugged by universities, selling a bag of magic beans and taking no responsibility for the consequences, then pleading poverty when there Ponzi scheme gets caught out.

That's between £ 6-10bn a year that could be saved in higher education and spent on schools.

Much more than faffing with VAT.

But that's because they are so inefficient. The place is hardly open ( what business would only use it's infrastructure 25% of the time?). The staff have low productivity, lots of overhead (pensions, sick pay, pronoun monitoring department)

Coupled with this the teaching is generally terrible. I interviewed a 12 of graduates for 2 positions recently and they couldn't construct an argument, produce a pitch, there maths was weak and current affairs knowledge was poor.

@ThinkingForward

‘pronoun monitoring department’

😂 funny not funny 😫

A list of pronouns my friends son had to choose from for an American uni. Then the lecturers had to remember everyone’s pronoun. 🙄

At a U.K. uni near us soon. If not already. Poor lecturers.

What do you mean "the place is hardly open?"

Exactly this, the dodo Brit brigade can't even fathom this. As long as the people doing better than them financially are out of pocket, that's all that matters. Jealousy.

Don't fear, they are doing away with EHCP's and 1-1. SEN is growing faster than the govt care for and so the support is going. Very few children will be getting much support. This cannot be blamed on private school's having vat relief- that won't generate even 5% of what is needed. The Brit buffoons need to learn to read and understand before jumping into unknown promises.

Well lets say 3x 8 weeks terms. May be 8-5 each day for lecturing of which a student might have formal lectures for as little as 10 hours a week.

It seems that more lectures could be provided and get the student to a higher level of proficiency with a smaller asset base.

Depends on the course
One of mine doing a medical degree has 45 weeks.
The other two have 36 / 39 weeks
Library and facilities open for longer
International students can stay in halls all year.

Oxbridge is shorter think it’s 24 weeks.
so your 24 weeks is the shortest and very unusual.

University students are supposed to be intelligent enough to do research themselves backed up with lectures and seminars etc Not spoon fed with daily classes.

Spoon fed is one thing but adding direction to learning is key. Many jobs are collaborative by there nature, learning by reading is one thing but if we are looking to train a workforce then the skills base is much wider than being able to digest a book and sit an exam.

Completely depends on the degree with regards to course content
Not all jobs are the same either.

Just think, if parents didn't have to shell out 100s or even 1000s of extra pounds on their mortgage because of Liz Truss, they would be able to absorb VAT on private school fees with money left over.🤦‍♀️