Council spends £8000pa on a taxi due to VAT on private schools

[Iwishicouldflyhigh]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14403627/Labours-VAT-raid-teenage-girl-private-school-council-fund-8-000-taxi-bill.html

So now a place is being taken up in an overscribed school, a 15 year old has had her eduction severely disrupted and the local council has 8k less in the pot.

Well done Labour!!! One of many stories, i'm sure and so predictable.

There’s a link to the services because Rutland has had quite a big armed forces presence for many years. Children from the nearby army camp go to either Catmose or CBEC. CBEC was the catchment secondary school so it was nigh on impossible to get your kids into Catmose if you moved in mid-year.

In one of the articles it says that a couple of other girls from the child”s old school are at Catmose, I’d imagine they couldn’t get her into one of the Lincolnshire grammars, and CBEC are oversubscribed too so that’s why they pushed for Catmose. There’s other schools in the area, but not as well performing.

Possibly as something seems off. Surely Lincolnshire would have found a school place closer ? Or did they but it was rejected hence the second appeal ?

So they picked the school they wanted not one that was closest with a space? So Lincolnshire should have told them sort the transport out as it’s your choice !

The most likely explanation is that she phoned around schools, asked which ones were receiving applications and applied to the nearest that was, otherwise she wouldn’t have been able to get the transport funding.

I mean I could try to apply to the 15 NHS dentists in a 2 mile radius of my house but if none of them are receiving applications there is little I can do.

She isn’t claiming help with anything. Her DD has free school transport as the required by law where the nearest space offered by the council is over three miles away.

Schools can’t refuse an application ? If they don’t have a place you go on the list but they can’t refuse an application!

Being ex-military gives zero advantages in the way you suggest. Once you leave, you are on your own for schooling. This was the main reason we ended up going private when my husband left. We couldn't get a primary place within about 10 miles of where we were relocating to without having to go to one that was in special measures. Everywhere else was on a wait list. So, we used his terminal gratuity to fund private.

I was just speculating really, as I had noticed military priority for schools near to us but as you say, not for ex-military, but thought maybe it was a possibility in this case.

There should always be a place available for every child. People move and life changes happen. The state has an interest and a legal obligation to educate every child. It shouldn’t take years of strategizing to simply get your child a seat in a school.

saying that parents should home school or deal with ridiculous transportation requirements because there is no place for their child is unfair. What if one of our families had to move suddenly because of a fire or a family emergency? Wouldn’t we want our child to be able to start school as soon as they are able so there is as little disruption to their education as possible?

Yes, you can go on a waiting list, but that does not affect your right to free transport if you are accepted by a school 25 miles away while all the others can merely wait list you.

I know children who have spent 2 years on waiting lists for schools and never got close to be offered a place at them.

Being on a waiting list for somewhere closer is not a school place.

But you should in that case stay on the other lists and accept a place where you don’t need transport

Why would you do that? What possible reason would any parent have for doing that? It is not their fault that the local schools had no places available.

What if that place is suddenly offered in January of Y11?

Why should a child have to make new friends, buy new uniform, start new exam boards, possibly not have even the same choice of subjects?

All because the council do not have a school place available for you close to your home?

So it looks like they have moved their child to an Ofsted Outstanding rated school, with a “well above average” progress score - so basically she gets to go to a really good school and the parents save thousands of pounds on school fees?

To be clear, I don’t agree with VAT being added to school fees and know that most private school leavers will not be this fortunate, but this is maybe not the best example for the campaign against VAT to use…

100% this. If you are in catchment of a school you get a place. It should be as simple as that. If there are too many pupils then they need to expand or open a new school locally.

I could be wrong but I think a lot of the US works that way. You just turn up on day 1 and register and you go to the school you are in catchment for. If you move out of catchment you move schools.

Children have to move schools all the time for all sorts of reasons . If you’re relying on the state to pay a huge amount for transport and there’s a closer place you either pay the transport costs yourself and stay at the school or accept the offer of a nearer one .

I don't know about "spite". There might be people who wouldn't claim for the council to pay for taxis and would choose to do a 100 mile a day school run to save the taxpayer's cash - but I don't think I know any of those people!

But this sounds like you are saying that private school pupils who have to leave because their parents can't afford the fees should be punished for their parents' choices by only being allowed whatever sink school place can be dredged up.

How dare a former private school student get an Outstanding school with "well above average" P8... and her parents now get to save all that money they were spending (and saving the taxpayer). The injustice!

But there is no evidence to suggest that the current school is the closest school with places that the council offered. The family have appeared to have gotten a place at the school of their choice,then browbeaten the council into providing free transport by repeatedly appealing the council’s decision until the council lost.

And whilst the father may have served in the army, right now he appears to be a mercenary working for the UAE.

I saw something else this week about a council
footing the VAT bill to keep children in private school because they don’t have space for them in local state schools. These families aren’t “entitled”, they have been paying into the system for years and not using it. But the govt have turned on them and now we are all starting to see the consequences.

And for everyone saying this family “failed to plan accordingly” - ffs, how many people could afford an extra £4k bill every year? £4k to pay for something you will literally never use (state school teachers supposedly) because you use a parallel (private) system. It’s insulting and it’s having a massive impact on family finances.

Except that legally you don't. Ah well...

It’s not a punshiment! It’s literally following the LA’s admissions criteria. And yes, that’s how school places work. Schools that are “better” are less likely to have fewer places available. Parents are moving from system where ability to pay is the determinant, to one where a number of other factors determine admission and they can no longer buy their way to the top of the queue.

The LA wouldn't fund a taxi if there was space in a school within the 3 mile radius.

It IS the LA’s responsibility though

No, really, not at all - just that using this case leaves the campaign against VAT open to criticism. My sympathies are with all children that have to move due to this and I hope that they get the best places possible.

And this child got lucky and landed a place at a great school. Good for her. She hasn't cheated the system - the system had no place for her close by, so she found a school that did.

Not everyone will get lucky that way - but it sounds like you are complaining that this child did.