Should everyone shut up about private school VAT?

[mynamechangemyrules]

IABU- please, do tell us again how 7% of the children are SO MUCH MORE important than the rest of the children and how this will TERRIBLY affect EVERYONE and especially poooooor people.

IANBU- stfu about private school VAT and ban any more posts from MN.
It'll be less than the schools have put up your fees in the last 5 years and you've managed that haven't you?

That is just about the most inaccurate and ill-informed post imaginable.

Most of the schools are charities meaning they make no profits. Their aim is to provide the best quality of education they can.

Selfish people don’t care about taxes that they don’t have to pay themselves.

that’s a stupid thing to say.

It's not a zero sum game though is it. That's one of the reasons why it's a shit idea and won't actually improve education.

I think that part of the reason that this issue has caused so much upset in certain quarters is that it's intended as an attack on private education. It is very disingenuous of Labour to suggest that the main purpose of this policy is to raise revenue. Labour has previously voted to ban private schools. This is purely an extension of that. If you want to raise revenue you don't do it by taxing in a way which will have an unknowable distortive effect on the market. If income tax had gone up by 2% I would have accepted that without comment but this is a "sin" tax (even if Labour won't admit that) and it therefore feels much more personal.

Most parents who choose to use the private sector made a considered decision to do so and believe in it. Of course some of them will be up in arms if it's under attack. And that is largely the point - it's a class war policy.

If you see it in that light this becomes about ideology. Labour's tenets on education seem to be:

• the state should have a monopoly on education;
• equality of education is more important than quality (which is the justification for levelling down);
• education should be standardised (and therefore there is no place for parental choice);
• selection by ability is wrong.

I think these are interesting issues and worthy of debate and that Labour's policy on private schools is highly relevant to that. I have very different views about education to Labour. Fundamentally, I don't think that it is sound policy to attack the part of a system which is working in order to improve the part that isn't.

It's like charging VAT on children's books in order to disincentive parents from reading to their children lest this disadvantage children whose parents don't read to them.

Charities that provide education for those poor children whose parents can afford to pay £thousands for the privilege? You don't think anyone is getting rich from all that money?

I know a lot of them have charitable status, and I know that's not currently planned to change, but don't kid yourself they are doing any more to benefit those in need than they need to in order to tick the boxes and call themselves a charity.

There are no UBO’s taking any money out. Google their financial returns and you’ll see.

Not all state schools are 'not working'. It's not as clear as that. I live in an area with outstanding state high schools which produce excellent results. Many have gone off to Oxford and other very well known universities from these state schools. The parents I know who send their children to private school in my area is because of the status of sending their child to the said private schools and that they simply don't want a mix of all social classes in the state school. This is what they believe in. There is a huge difference between the state schools in my area and the ones in the next town. I think getting all state schools to the same level should be a priority. I can assure you disadvantaged mums do read to their kids. They maybe just need more support with it from schools.

YANBU.

At the very least people could wait and see what Labour actually propose, once they get that far down their list.

IABU- please, do tell us again how 7% of the children are SO MUCH MORE important than the rest of the children and how this will TERRIBLY affect EVERYONE and especially poooooor people

This is vile, OP. And no one has said that anyway. There are some sensible arguments both for and against but no need to be rude about the children it concerns. Their parent's choices are nor their fault and whether you want to lisyen or not, it's pretty crap being a child who's parents move you from somewhere you are settled snd happy because of this policy.

Private schools are businesses and their aim is to make profits

Nah. You're wrong. The aim is to educate. Any surplus is invested back into facilities to attract new parents.

As an aside, many private schools are in listed buildings which makes buildings management all the more expensive. Parents have to pay that, alongside everything else.

There was no reason to start yet another thread about this topic if you're so sick of it OP🙄

The policy actually directly affects my child/family and even I've had enough of reading/hearing about it on here and elsewhere.

So now you have started yet ANOTHER thread to argue that PS parents should STFU.

But you are the one who keeps starting the threads. You are the one obsessed about this OP. It’s a joke.

This. Parents who don’t care about the VAT situation are quite capable of scrolling past any threads on the subject - just as I’m assuming they do with any subject they aren’t interested in. Or else they’d be on mn 24/7 commenting on threads.
Starting yet another thread complaining about threads they aren’t being forced to read just makes people look like frothing at the mouth obsessives.

There are one or two peculiar obsessives here on MN for sure. Nearly all the threads I’ve seen started on this subject are by people who don’t even have kids in PS.

You want to ban posts on a topical issue? I don't think you quite understand how forums work.

She / he doesn’t want to ban anything. Quite the opposite - they are clearly devastated when a thread on this runs out and can hardly contain themselves before starting another one. Oh, the excitement of it all.

The only reason I’m posting at this hour btw is because I’m in the opposite time zone at the moment!

Haha, same! high fives

Not in my list of trending topics.

👏👏👏

Totally

A lot of private school parents aren't that fussed. It will push some of the wannabes out who can barely afford it and our kids will get better teacher to child ratios etc. And we now feel we are doing our bit to help your povo kids out. You're all very welcome.

Private healthcare companies like BUPA etc pay tax don't they? Or am I wrong? I really don't see that private education should be treated any differently....

YANBU - the amount of posts on this subject is astonishing, yet I don't hear this discussed outside this forum. It is like the FWR threads on trans people - a subject no one I know discusses or really cares about, yet there is post after post on it.

It is odd that sections of Mumsnet are so obsessed with school fees and trans people - such a strange combination to cause such disproporationate outrage. It would be interesting to know if there was an overlap in the posters 😂

Please don’t shut up about the VAT. You’ve all made me realise how great it’s going to be when my DC goes to one of the best 6th form state colleges in the country.

I’d not have looked if you hadn’t all opened my eyes.

My DC loved it. All his mates are going. I’m going to save ££££££££.

I can afford the VAT, but it made me look around, and I’m really happy he’s moving, we get to have an extra 20K to spend on nice stuff, and he gets to put “state” on his uni application.