To think taxing private schools...

[maddening]

I have no skin in the game, my dc is at a secondary state school. I have no strong views on private schools - although I think state should offer the same level for all dc.

However, looking at the maths I am not convinced the cost and benefits of this proposal works out - apparently vat will bring in 1.3 billion - however if the 554,000 children in private schools had to be schooled in state schools that would cost 4 billion - aibu to think this is not the win that many are led to believe? It is more divisive imo and driven by ideology.

If the private school parents are saving the state 4 billion a year then I don't have an issue with the vat personally.

I think that there could be more requirements placed on private schools in order to retain the vat free status, such as sharing facilities with local state schools and more subsidised places perhaps, or means tested vat relief for parents?

These bloody threads are popping up quicker than I can hide them. Could you really not make this point on one of the many other discussions?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/05/17/jeremy-hunt-chancellor-conservatives-labour-spending-plans/#:~:text=Labour

There you go.

Given that many schools have falling rolls (including schools in London) this maybe isn't the problem you think it is.

Our local private secondary runs masterclasses for state Yr 6 bright kids. It sounds nice on paper on reality it's a marketing exercise that feels like time share selling. It's all tickbox to retain charity status.

More invested parents in the state sector wouldn't be a bad thing.

A very trustworthy source.

Because a large number of voters will support it even if it actually costs more to the taxpayers than it raises.

It's the politics of envy.

What I don't understand is why stop at private education- surely it would be more "fair" to tax private health care that allows people to jump NHS queues whilst others have to suffer in pain?

All the children in private schools aren't going to move to the state sector though. Some who's parents are just about affording it will, but there are plenty of others who can well afford the extra and others prepared to cut back on a little luxury to continue affording it. There's a lot of noise and scaremongering and framing it in the terms you have, simply because they don't want to.

It's far easier to attack this than address real change within state and sort out ignorance around sen

People with private healthcare don't jump NHS queues, it's a different queue. People come from many countries to use private healthcare here which must produce some revenue in taxes and daily costs while here

They are not all going to leave!

Is this for real? In what planet does this mean that every single privately educated child will leave and go to state school? What a ridiculous suggestion. Plus for all the people moaning about this- the actual number who will actually have to pull their children out will be a minute proportion. When people are using food banks and struggling to heat their homes, someone who has a spare £10k a year to spend on school fees is certainly not a priority. Yes they all peddle the "we are not rich" argument and we scrimp and save. Many are scrimping and saving and can't feed their families. A proportion that has risen exponentially thanks to the incompetence of this government and their devotion to keeping the rich rich. I say that as someone who could afford private school for my children so it's not the politics of envy, but I am not so bloody selfish as to only look at my own situation and not care about the plight of so many in hardship. I'll happily pay more tax if it means the NHS stops collapsing or schools are properly funded. Change can't come soon enough.

I agree with you, most people who want to add vat are just spiteful or have been tricked by the attention grabbing headline

The argument against private schools for me is similar to that of grammar schools. They cream off the hardworking students with supportive parents, leaving comprehensive schools with a higher proportion of challenging students than they would otherwise have.
spread the challenging students out between a load of positive peers and they’re manageable.
It’s not the same for healthcare. Adding some middle class, healthy people into the NHS system doesn’t make other patients easier to treat.
parents should have the right to choose private schools, but those schools should be treated like the businesses they are, not charities.

Conservative central office are on a roll

However private schools aren’t business, they have no shareholders, no profit or loss. They educate children, and save the taxpayer money

Genuine question- would you still support VAT on private education if the policy cost the taxpayer more money than it raised?

More invested parents in the state sector wouldn't be a bad thing.

This. Hoops make results go up. Whether those hoops are financial, religious or language. Hoop-jumping parents in the state sector are likely to improve it.

It is possible to pay to jump the queue - many specialists do both NHS and private work and you can pay to see them privately and have them refer you to their NHS practice. You don't jump the queue post-referral but you do avoid waiting several months or more to see the specialist in the first place.

You don’t think removing disruptive kids from mainstream schooling into a service that can better suit their needs might improve the education of EVERYONE? As someone who went to a school with a LOT of challenging students, the lessons when I learned were when they were streamed on ability, which streamed the challenging kids out. The other subjects I just got a textbook and taught myself. A total waste of time.

95% of what a private school does better than state school is providing a calm, well resourced learning environment.

Well not all of the 554k private pupils will suddenly move to state just because the fees have increased by 20% will they? Most parents will still be prepared to pay for their children to have an advantage.

Not that I believe the level of attrition will be this high, but If 30% of privately educated children switch to state schools, there will be zero fiscal gain and the state schools which, already struggling, will face additional strain to accommodate them.

Additionally, every private school will be able to reclaim VAT on capital expenditure costs in some cases going back many years, and then on all future VAT qualifying costs. That VAT rebate will be hundreds of millions minimum and paid by the taxpayer.

Also the majority of boarders outside of London, are children from military families. They are funded (up to 90%) by the CEA (Continuity of Education Allowance).

This value is circa £300million per annum currently, so an additional £60 million will be paid to meet the VAT on their fees.

Point is, this policy is ill thought out. The analogy earlier of private healthcare is comparable.

If VAT is added to Uni fees in the future, many supporters of this policy would be quite upset. If VAT is added to private school fees I hope this extends to Uni fees in the future. Policies should be consistent.

It would be better for a digital sales tax across UK territory to be implemented, which would bring in a fortune from tax dodging companies and pump this income into the state education budget.

My neighbour is a police officer and his wife a nurse. Their only child was bullied terribly in state and they sacrificed everything to pay for private school. He told me in the pub the VAT addition would finish it for them. Perhaps those who are gleeful at the thought of this policy should consider families like this.

Have you got any idea how hard it is to get the department of education to admit anything they are doing is going badly / change anything? I am an “invested” parent and the school were not providing my severely dyslexia child with any support. They said they had no resources, and to complain to the council. I did this. It took months before anyone got back to me. Months. The council said it was up to the school and closed my complaint. I appealed and they actually admitted there should be some support and started providing some that all pupils in the school could access. This took over a year, and in all that time my child (7/8-ish) was struggling. He is now at a private secondary and Is provided with Themis support automatically. No need to argue. No need to write endless letters. It’s why I’ll be keeping him there’s, VAT or no VAT.

No, I support it because the country is absolutely broke and it's going to raise much needed money for our public services. I'd rather the money came from taxing luxury spend by wealthy people than spending less on the people and services that need it.

A digital sales tax would not bring in any money. France tried it and made a loss as Trump (USA home to most big digital companies) just massively ramped up the import duty of French wine in response. There are no great untapped areas of free tax. If there were the UK government would have gone there.

The OECD is introducing a minimum corporation tax rate which ought to help in the long term with tax avoiding companies, but there certainly isn’t a magic button HMRC can press to get lots of tax from these companies immediately.

@Bessica1970
I think the argument about the state sector being fixed with the addition of on average 1-2 possibly better behaved or higher performing children per class from private schools is very tenuous. Let’s say you have a difficult class with disruptive behaviour, possibly violence etc. How is the addition of a couple of children from a private school meant to solve this problem and why is it their responsibility?

Added to that not every student in private school would be a “good influence “. Quite a lot of the children in private school are there because they struggled in the state sector for some reason e.g SEN. And of course the private school students aren’t likely to be going into the schools with the biggest issues anyway.

There’s an argument that parents who previously used the private sector might somehow improve state schools but again this doesn’t seem like a good basis for tax policy. I use the private sector partly because I’m a single parent with a demanding career and the private sector is supportive of that in a way the state sector isn’t. I don’t have the time or skills to sort out a failing state school and other than supporting my own child’s education I wouldn’t be doing anything for the school they were at. So far as I can tell most state schools aren’t interested in what parents have to say anyway because they’re not the customer.

To bring down the hardworking positive kids as that exactly what will happen. Same as when councils send trouble families into a nice area. They don't improve merely bring the area down