To not see how the gov will make any money from taxing private schools?

[AngryHedgehog]

All the other threads seem to have descended into bunfighting over the ethics of the policy, yet I'm not really understanding how this stands to benefit the government as surely they'll be footing the bill for all the kids that move to state schools?

As a disclaimer, I don't have kids and wouldn't be able to afford to privately educate them even if I did, despite earning a half decent salary.

I'm reading that it costs around £7k per pupil per term, so it would take the VAT from around four families to fund each additional child moving to state education.

Given that this may be 4/10 kids in private education moving to state schooling, I don't see how this doesn't create a net loss as there will only be 50% more kids left in private education and there needs to be multiple times that for the VAT increase to foot the bill.

Surely I'm missing something here?

What’s the plan for labour “sorting it”.

If that's the case maybe your calculation was so tight it was hugely risky to start with. What would you do in the event of further mortgage rises?

Well we wouldn’t,only a tiny percentage of the population are privately educated.

Whatever it is I don't agree that putting VAT on school fees is the answer.

Yes, private. The point I was trying to make is that even in wealthy areas, there's multiple head winds impacting on decisions as to state vs private. Round our way, the primaries are mainly fine to good. So on balance people are choosing state in greater numbers than before.

25% in Edinburgh, not such a tiny percentage

Quit with the over dramatisation and trashing of state education. Chair throwing at teachers isn’t an every day occurrence across the whole sector. Schools wouldn’t pass Ofsted if it was.🙄

Okaaay so Edinburgh accounts for the whole of the UK now.

Exactly this. It’s ridiculous.

@Uplift I'm telling you as someone who could afford the 20% rise and who is and has friends in the "top" professions from a state school. The benefits you think labour are going to get are going to be concentrated in a very small number of schools most of which are already outstanding.

Even if you tax us out of private schools the kids will go to the grammar's, faith schools or in our local area the outstanding schools (ex grammars with high house prices).

We would move house before DS went to a sink school which we have, we are currently renovating a dive we will likely sell on once finished getting back the money we would have spent on education so win win for us, the difference in house price btw for a 2 mile move was more than a private secondary education.

I can only go off our area but the well behaved kids are concentrated in certain schools (faith, state and private) whilst the other schools get the kids of the parents who frankly don't care and allow them to misbehave.

615,000 isn’t tiny. State schools would not be able to cope with the numbers.

your comments on this thread sound like you have a massive personal vendetta/chip on your shoulder and are just disagreeing with everything without actually understanding what you’re disagreeing with.

I'm not trashing a state education. This is my lived experience. One of my kids goes to a state school and so do many of their friends. You are right that some schools don't experience these issues but these tend to be those in naice areas with specific catchments.

Those secondary schools (and some junior schools) in more mixed catchments or poorer catchments are dealing with this and worse everyday. I am not over dramatising at all. This is the reality of education in some schools. More time and effort is put into discipline than education. You are very naive to believe otherwise. This is a key driver of inequality and shouldn't be so readily dismissed.

Not even going to bother to reply to that it’s just appalling.

There are about 100,000 children with SEN in private schools, who don't have ehcps. Their parents funding these places are saving the state an absolute fortune.

@SpudleyLass
But ‘private’ places awarded at tribunal cost the tax payer a 6 figure sum, per child per year. Less private schools will mean that more SEN schools will have to be built and the 6 figure sum, per child per year will support the expansion of the state maintained special school system.

some private schools will fail as a result at which point the state sector will have to find places for a large proportion of pupils from the failed school.

@Circe7
And that will be a huge benefit in keeping state schools open. At least two thirds of the schools in my LA took under their PAN last year (published statistics). The same LA has closed 16 state schools in the last five and a half years.
It will be great news for state schools to have an influx of children.

and many state schools will struggle to accommodate more children.

@squirrelnutkin10

No they really won’t, falling birth rates means plenty of school places. More children means an increased budget and more schools being sustainable. See above, 16 schools have had to be closed in the last five and a half years, in my LA. This is due to falling roles, impacting on the budget, and the quality of education including social, that can be provided.

It's not appalling, it's just being honest about how people will behave.

Just like the rest of the UK, private school educated pupils are not evenly distributed across the UK. Space in state schools in Cromer are not a lot of use when you need more spaces in Thetford. As I pointed out, in Edinburgh alone if 40% of private pupils moved to state it would require the building and staffing or many more primary and secondary schools, which would probably eat up most of the suggested income in just one city.

You write as though all this additional money for SEN places and keeping schools open comes from nowhere. You do realise tax payers will have to be funding all this? How on earth is this good news?

16 schools have had to be closed in the last five and a half years, in my LA.

That would be a considerable saving to the tax payer that could be spen5 elsewhere.

And we’re back to kids leaving private all being SEN. It was good little grammar kids a couple of posts back.

I’m going to take my three out of private school after next year due to the VAT rise. I’m planning to move house to be walking distance from the relatively decent state school. The increase in housing costs will pay for themselves as no school fees and I’ll end up growing my money rather than spending it.

Will pay for tutors, camps etc. as lots of spare cash. Have made a load of connections at the school so the DC already have a great network but will score some points at Uni for coming from a state school.

Planning on both going part time (both senior NHS) so no more spending my weekends clearing waiting lists. I can relax more and won’t have to work mad hours. Feel this is going to be really good for me personally but not sure how it’ll make the government any money!

The question is actually: why the hell aren't private schools paying VAT in the first place? The fact they get charitable status is ridiculous. None of them do enough community work to merit this. Essentially they're been subsidised by the tax payer for decades, and why should the tax payer be paying for children that aren't their own to get an elite education? Private schools are run for profit. They are businesses. If parents have an issue with school fees going up, they can take it up with the schools.

Less than 7% of kids go to private school - although all their parents seem to be on Mumsnet all of a sudden. It's not going to be a huge influx of kids into the state sector, as they won't all leave. And if the state sector hadn't been run down by the Tories for the past 14 years, it would be equipped to cope with those entering it from the private sector. Hopefully the additional parent power (and of course a Labour government) will actually see some of the schools improve.

Because the six figure sum per child per year is already tax payer money that goes ‘out’ to the private sector.

The same tax payer funded six figure sum per child per year could be used in the state system.

Maintained schools would benefit hugely from the tax payer funded six figure sum per child per year, improving staffing, facilities and increasing places.

LA’s are currently fire fighting in a viscious circle to address SEN. Not enough SEN places, LA legally has to provide a place, independent place gained, Hughes amounts of money paid out per child, hence not enough money to improve the maintained SEN provision.

Many families will behave exactly the same, understandably. This has the following consequences for 3 children :

• the loss of around £10k a year predicted VAT based on average fees.
• cost to the taxpayer of £24k to educate 3 children in the state sector
• spending on tutors which generally aren’t subject to VAT (something the IFS haven’t considered).
• less income tax and NIC from your jobs
• less manpower in the NHS

And this policy is apparently a sensible one……

why the hell aren't private schools paying VAT in the first place?

You will be relieved that we voted for Brexit and left the EU then.

Tax payers should be funding SEN kids. Why should parents be penalised for having SEN kids? In the last few years, the Tories have closed down the local SEN schools (at least in this area of the south east), forcing parents either to put their kids into private school if they could, or just struggle with mainstream or home schooling. They should reopen. It's not an argument for not charging VAT for private schools.