To be completely shocked by this - Bridget can’t tell us the impact of the government’s VAT on Education?

[Sasskitty]

Bridget Phillipson dodges question on impact of private school tax raid

As parents and schools complain of chaos, Ms Phillipson refuses to spell out details of the assessment made by the department for education

Bridget Phillipson failed to spell out the full impact of the government’s private school VAT raid, dodging the question when asked about the possible implications for special education schools.

While she said the government has “looked at all of the potential impacts”, her answer failed to provide any real detail on the expected consequences.

It comes as parents and schools complain about the implications of the tax raid, which came into force on New Year’s Day and is expected to raise £1.5bn for the Treasury.

YABU - Bridget Phillipson has it all in hand. She just didn’t feel like answering the pesky question. The point is to piss rich people off. Leave Labour alone, they want nothing but erm oh I’m not sure.

YANBU - Phillipson clearly has no idea what the impact of VAT on Education will be. Nor does she really care as long as she’s seen to be punishing those horrible rich people. Or even better (it seems) the not really rich ones just trying to improve the education of their children as the available state schools were not suitable.

https://apple.news/AO7fcmrzuRaik4stLaPQxwA

(sorry paywall but there’s not much more in the article)

PS. I’ve removed the poll tally, no one needs to see real data. Do they?

@CatkinToadflax - there are those whose needs the state failed to meet and had to go to the independent sector.
And then there are those for whom a school move is really detrimental to their mental health, due to their SEND. And Covid will have already impacted some of those.
It is immoral as a society to tax any of the kids in these categories. It is far from “good”, it is the opposite.

Absolutely yes.

So you wouldn't have entered the private system if you had the choice not to. Yet you have actively chosen to send your non-SEN DC2 to private school. How does this square?

Is this supposed to be some sort of “gotcha”? His needs weren’t met in the state school sector either. He was bullied for having a disabled brother and very unhappy. And it was far easier to have two very young children in the same setting. And my mum helped hugely with the fees.

I find it extraordinary that by sharing my own lived experiences, the unpleasant comments keep coming. Why do people care so much that they ask such nasty questions? (“How does this square?” is what I’m referring to here.)

‘It's not a business.
Private schools are businesses. They sell a service to customers who pay.’

its not all bad, some of the smaller, badly run schools may be closing but as with any marketplace there are businesses that are thriving too. Brighton College is opening yet another school.

It is you who is being aggressive. How is it unpleasant to ask what you meant saying that it was only SEN needs that made you go private yet you have a non-SEN DC in the private sector? It was a simple question as what you said did not make sense.

Its not really a difficult thing to work out surely, even leaving aside the poster's update about her non SEN son's needs...having children at different schools can be a logistical challenge and if finances allow, why not put them both in the same setting? You seem determined to try and undermine the position that many of us have found ourselves in...a lack of suitable provision in state. Bottom.line is that this VAT policy will do nothing to improve that and only harm those affected. Even if that's a handful of children, which it isn't, it's still morally reprehensible.

‘having children at different schools can be a logistical challenge’

You know, it isn’t as if state school families don’t have the same issues. Not sure why the people with £££ and an urge to spend it on fees think they’re the only ones who worry about their children and their education

I was just asking a logical question. Are these not allowed?

As a family, we never had any dislike of private schools, it just never occurred to us that we would need to use them. That’s all. I was merely pointing out that some of us had to consider private education, who wouldn’t have had to if we didn’t have a disabled child. That’s all.

Well @AgathaPanthus - it is quite distasteful if you are asking these kinds of questions of parents with children with quite challenging SEND needs. I really do hope the ministers in charge will be dealing with this question a lot more gracefully. If the policy does not work economically, then it cannot continue.
Someone should have planned for that eventuality. Given the unlimited access to legal, financial and economic advisors, there really is no excuse.

The longer this continues to harm children, the worse the outcomes will be. And the worse implications for us as a country.

It is frankly embarrassing to count yet another embarrassing first, among our own goals. We just look petty, incompetent and divisive to the rest of the world.

You were quite clearly trying to trip up the poster in some way by implying she secretly prefers private education as she's chosen it for both her children, not just the one with unmet needs. She has subsequently explained the need her other son had but regardless, even if her older boy was ok in state, there may be very mundane practical reasons to have them together, nothing to do with ideology.
@Letlooseonthedanse not sure where you got the idea from that I think that. Of course I don't and neither does anyone else.

It really is depressing how many people on these threads want to go all through some spectacular mental gymnastics to avoid acknowledging the truth that many of us have been forced to finance private through the lack of state provision. Our decision and ability to do that (often by a fingernail) does not imply anything at all about those who absolutely cannot do likewise and I have nothing but sympathy for those who find themselves with no educational provision at all. I don't understand the rationale behind making it even harder FOR NO PRACTICA BENEFIT.

It is not distasteful to ask a simple question. Unless you are just trying to create an echo chamber @Araminta1003?

Thank you @RhaenysRocks and @Araminta1003 .

I never intend to be aggressive and apologise if I have been. It’s bloody exhausting having a (wonderful) child with special needs, with very little support. We have had to make different choices as a family than we would have done if he hadn’t been born extremely prematurely with multiple disabilities.

You are clearly very angry and frustrated. That is no excuse to take your anger out on me and accuse me of spectucular mental gymnastics. I have a DC with SEN. We made our decisions on their education on a child by child basis.

@AgathaPanthus I'm perfectly calm actually but it does get irritating when posters who use private are constantly quizzed and undermined and have their motives questioned. I'm not attacking you or anyone else, but there is so much ignorance and misunderstanding and sometimes willful obtuseness. When what we are discussing is childrens' wellbeing..all children, the stakes are high.

What echo chamber @AgathaPanthus - I have DC in state schools. My DC with SEND was fine in a high achieving grammar with similar boys.

I can just spot a dud policy when I see one, lacking in merit and proportionality and harming a ton of kids and families and teachers and communities. I simply don’t see the point in an anomaly like this that won’t even make us better off as a nation. Other countries must literally think we are crazy! I am sick and tired of divisive and pointless politics put forward by a few angries who don’t understand economics or how the world works.

And I don’t care about how popular a policy is anymore either. Brexit was popular and looks like Reform is increasingly popular. So “popularity” appears to me to be the opposite of the sensible and rationale. In fact, the more populist, the more harmful, it appears to me.

In this particular case, I find it quite extraordinary that the general public was just as misled as with Brexit. Exemptions for children with special needs and disabilities were promised. Yet they came up with the most narrow exemption via an EHCP paid for by the council for particular independent schools only. I find that quite extraordinary and also short-sighted given the financial predicament many councils are in. The fact there are statistics out there proving parents often win on appeal and that councils are incentivised to delay. One would surmise someone with a modicum of intelligence would have realised such an exemption is too narrow!

How would you assess which children with SEN (but no EHCP) need to be there, and which are there but would be fine in a mainstream school? How do you assess who has SEN? Do they need to have a diagnosis?

Besides which, aren't the SEN children affected by this policy change a minority of a minority? Of course they matter, I'm not lying otherwise, but I don't know if there is any policy that doesn't negatively affect someone.

@MrsSchrute - but who actually benefits from the VAT policy to make up for the harms? Where is the proportionality? It certainly isn’t going to pay for 6500 new teachers and a free for all breakfast for all primary school children, is it now? So yes, misleading, in more than one way. Populism at its worst.

A policy can negatively affect a group, even a minority group, if it is counterbalanced by a benefit for the majority that is real, tangible, an actual fact. This one isn’t, There are a multitude of exemptions already, it’s messy, won’t generate much revenue, if at all, the more business minded richer schools can plan around it, the list of why it doesn’t work proportionally just goes on and on, yet dogma appears to prevail. It’s quite astonishing really.

And yes, I would accept an exemption for anyone with a diagnosis from a professional. I think it is foolish not to.

As you know, autism is a wide spectrum. Some children with autism will be absolutely fine in mainstream school, some are non verbal and will never live independently, and many are somewhere in between.
So just in this specific example, a child having an autism diagnosis would in no way prove that they cannot be educated in a mainstream setting and therefore must use private school.

It's so complex, which is why they've gone down the EHCP round I'd imagine. The same way that they don't means test child benefit, winter fuel allowance etc.

No they have only gone down the EHCP which specifically names the school. An EHCP which doesn't name the school won't be accepted for exemption

Yes, sorry, that's what I meant.

@MrsSchrute - most children with autism find a school change, pretty much enforced by a Government, more disruptive than neurotypical children though. I am sure expert witnesses can attest that as fact, on a population basis.