To be glad that the VAT on school fees

[Shaketherombooga]

Is now going to be happening in January? what’s the point in stalling it? I think it’s one of many decisions that we just need to get in with.

YABU - it’s SO unfair. Labour hates ‘strivers’ etc etc

YANBU - Yup, Labour said they are taking away tax breaks for private schools, so let’s get on with it.

Politics of envy. Race to the bottom under the labour loonies.

True, but those jobs are not experiencing massive shortages of employees. There would be displacement away from private and into state. Whether or not it is a musical chairs with other jobs makes no matter.

You use allowances from previous years and stagger over the next few years but in all likelihood the poster was talking about over the course of the child’s years in education.

Presumably the poster was referring to the fees she paid over a number of years during her DC's education so instead of paying those fees, she would have paid an equivalent amount into her pension each year. That's exactly what I will be doing as soon as my DS finishes private school (we are going to put him in state sixth form.) I'll massively increase my pension contributions and pay a lot less income tax. Can't wait!

There is this thing called moving. It’s when you lose your job and then move to another city to take up a new job. The new city can be tens, hundreds or even a thousand miles away! That is the great thing about today. People don’t tend to be born, work and die within the same 3 square miles.

People aren’t going to move house to put their child into a failing school in London with spaces if they live in Derbyshire. And neither can they be forced to.

And meanwhile, Labour MPs are pushing for the abolishment of the two child benefit cap. My take on that is if you can’t afford to have more than two children, then don’t. I work full time, always have, as does my dh. I would have loved 3 or 4 children, but couldn’t afford to have them, so stuck with two. Why should it be any different for those on benefits? Some had three when they were affluent and could afford them, so I get that might not have been a choice they needed to make at the time, but many, many more had a third and forth child knowing they couldn’t afford them, but had them anyway. And yet Labour clearly think it’s more important to subsidise peoples poor choices, than allow parents the choice to have their children educated privately, which they pay for, without clawing back through VAT.

@LoremIpsumCici so what? Oxbridge is definitely NOT the only way to achieve your ambitions. DH grew up in care, I’m from a single parent family. Neither of us went anywhere near anywhere like “oxbridge” but we’ve done very nicely thank you, without oxbridge or inheritance or anything else that we haven’t bloody worked our arse of for. And I STILL don’t think private school fees should have VAT on them.

I can't see many spending more, unless it's abroad. My DB bought a holiday home in France once his DC left school. If his children had attended state school I'm sure they would have done this sooner.

People also seem to be missing the point that it’s easiest to move children at a natural change point so at reception at year 3 or at year 7. Those children go into the mix in the same way as everyone else so it isn’t necessarily those children who find themselves without a place at the good state school. It’s just as likely to be someone who has always been in the state system.

I don’t think they are “superior beings” but it is not a chestnut to say that the higher you are up the ladder of wealth, the more power and influence you have.

The middle class, despite being numerically small (top 6%) has more power than the entire working class (93%). As it has been for years, the wealthy elite (the 1%) have kept the middle class on their side by making private schools within reach for upper middle and then providing bursaries and financial aid for “deserving” lower middle.

Once it’s just the wealthy elite on their own, working class and middle class have a better chance to tip the balance a bit and influence the government to take better care of the state education system.

Why don’t you take that up with the OP who started a goady thread to gloat about the VAT being added? She/he can barely contain her glee! No whingeing from her/him at all.

I am sure not all the schools in Derbyshire are oversubscribed ;)
They wouldn’t have to go so far as London.

Wrong. Plenty of people live in or near Cambridge and send their children to independent schools. I don’t think it’s fair to say that none of them will be worrying about the VAT increase in fees. Stop generalising. It’s so unhelpful and it’s actually an incredibly stressful time for many, many parents. The reverse snobbery from some people who are delighting in other people’s trouble is just horrid.

@Molly499

"It's the right thing to do. I don't think anyone thinks that this will magically transform state schools. But it's a start. It's an injection of much needed cash. That's a good thing. More will be needed."

Out of interest would you still support VAT on private education if this measure actually cost more money to raise than it generated in tax revenue.

My concern here is that the forecasted £1.6 billion pa doesn't factor in:

Private schools can now claim back VAT for expenditure (going back several years)
A large number of private school parents will have pre paid school fees.
The boarding / extra curricular/ education split will be adjusted to reduce the tax burden on the education element.
Lastly if 10% or more private school pupils move to the state schools then it will cost more than it raises.

Every new Government is free to raise taxes in whatever manner it sees best, but it's pretty dumb to introduce a tax that costs more to raise than it generates.

I agree. And hopefully the kids coming over from private will bring, generally, better behaviour and high expectations with them.

Bums on seats is so important for school resourcing.

And the gov can bolster state school funding with the money from the VAT that the rich are left paying.

Where on earth do you get the figure of 6% for middle class?

Hows that? The annual limit on tax free pension savings is £60k.
https://www.gov.uk/tax-on-your-private-pension/annual-allowance

🤦🏻‍♀️ The poster wasn't talking about every year, they clearly stated over the years her child was in school.

I wouldn’t be too sure about high expectations or better behaviour… my kids are f*ing awfully behaved 🤣 jokes but no the same behaviour issues are in private and state schools and a lot of children with SEN are in private schools- some will be moving into state schools and will increase that pressure on the SENDCO . Again I talk first hand, my children have SEN and the private school have been able to support and deal with them with no need for EHCPs.

The school fees are payable annually not in a single lump sum and would be funded from my PAYE income. I’d just increase my salary sacrifice pension contributions each year to total an additional 500k over the 14 years combined.

Have you got your figures right? There are more middle class people than that. Plenty of whom who send their kids to state school.

As a teacher in a small indie I think this is a threat to schools like mine. If my school closes (I’m pretty confident it won’t, but you never know..) I won’t be taking my 20+ years of experience to a state school. I’ll simply leave teaching. I think this is a fairly typical stance as well.

Where are Starmer’s 6500 teachers coming from for state schools? Recruitment is down, retention is down and predictions about spaces in state schools have been over-estimated.

It’s a perfect storm for state ed. Out pricing many families from indie ed just adds to it.

Genius!

I don't support Vat on school fees, economically it will be a waste of time. By the time they have pushed through the new bill and implemented this the government will have spent more than they could possibly raise in the first year. Never mind the huge loss of tax revenue from the people that will now use the 'school fee' income to put into pensions, it's a lose lose for the government and the kids just to satisfy the 'you can't have what I can't have' brigade. Sickening lack of insight.

They really shouldn’t panic as there is the Cambridgeshire Area Partnership where all students from participating Cambridgeshire State schools in the CAP have automatic admissions priority over all other applicants- either state school not in the CAP or private school.

After all CAP state school students that meet the admission score requirements are admitted, that usually only leaves some 500 places for students from private schools or other nonCAP state schools.

No state school student from the CAP will miss out due to private school students applying to Hills Rd.

I wondered what would happen with this. I used to work in a private school (I was one of the very few with QTS status in the school) so I could transfer to state and did back and forth for a number of years. However many teachers in private schools don’t have QTS so can’t just switch over and some (at the school my kids are at) have said they like the small independent schools and they won’t move as they’ve not signed up for that and will just swap careers.

As someone in the teaching profession - I would love to know where the 6500 teachers are going to come from? From my PGCE we did a survey last year and 50% have left the profession , people aren’t lining up to teach and I can’t blame them to be fair.