To be gleeful that most of us were right

[Wranglestar]

https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/adding-vat-to-private-school-fees-has-had-no-obvious-impact-on-state-sector-applications-390546/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR2ATdaVlNkJsbtC-KizuW4Fw41obnpvezxnFv4IAFwzJPHXmU90Awr5eqAaem9tMIsn9I0vHSC4jrdYONIA#0rd9makyd4264nstc4us9j77yk5kaoswtLondon Economic

And that private schools has had no impact on state school places. The rich have simply - paid more. Excellent news!

Social­ism is a phi­los­o­phy of fail­ure, the creed of igno­rance, and the gospel of envy, its inher­ent virtue is the equal shar­ing of misery.”

And yes, YABVVVU to post that pic of the useless gurning twat. Gave me quite a fright.

I think it's far too soon to tell what the overall impact of this will be. Most parents will understandly be very reluctant to move their children out of private school mid-key stage and they will be borrowing from their own parents, remortgaging and taking out loans to get them through to an appropriate time to move their children. This will be especially true if the only state school places available to them are the ones nobody wants, and that's quite likely if they are trying to move mid-key stage.

You'll see a big difference when it comes to new registrations at reception level, then year 6 and then sixth form though. That's when children who might have gone to private school now won't be going, and some of those currently in private school will be pulled out and moved into state.

For the ones who need to move school, their parents may be looking at moving house or even moving to a completely different part of the country to get an acceptable state school place, or they might be working on a plan for one paretn to give up work and home educate.

What will be happening is that people who would have liked private school but are now questioning the cost and the benefits will be sinking all their efforts and resources into securing housing in the catchment of the best state schools and spending their money on tutoring for the eleven plus in grammar areas.

The stupid thing about this whole thing is that if you are fundamentally opposed to private education on the grounds that it benefits the privileged (it does) and disadvantages lower income kids (it doesn't) then if you abolished it tomorrow that really would be a problem for state schools. Because those parents already pay a contribution to state education through the general taxation system but are currently not using the places their children are entitled to. If every child left private education then state schools would need to absorb them all but not a penny of extra money would be coming their way under the current arrangement.

Yet this private school tax raises a relatively small amount of money and some schools have already found perfectly legal accounting loopholes that mean they can claim back more from HMRC than the government stands to collect in extra taxes from the parents at that school.

You're gleeful that the private school kids with the least rich parents are the only ones who have to change schools? And many of them will be ND because their parents were desperate and begged and borrowed to scrape together the fees.

You are being stupid
The sort of parents who would send their children to private school, are NOT the sort of parents to pull them out in the middle of the school year
You wont know the effects until September

Haven’t read tft but I think it’s a bit premature to make assumptions after just one term. 2 private schools in our area have closed (one junior, one senior). Pretty sure there’s another junior school about to go under. Not all parents will stay in the private sector and you also haven’t taken into account the start of new intakes in a September term yet…. More prudent to wait and see. The Brexiteers were all joyful in the aftermath of the vote saying “yay, look - it’s fine” and our economy really hasn’t ever recovered so I think rushing to any conclusion is ill judged right now…

I think we are, yes. Not that being in or out of the EU is at all relevant. This hasn't happened because leaving the EU facilitated it, clearly, otherwise it wouldn't be happening in Greece either. In Ireland and France not only are private school fees not taxable, but I believe the fees are actually much cheaper because they take into account the tax you have already paid for a state school place you are not using. Not quite sure of how it works exactly, but you get some sort of tax break on school fees. In Australia too I think, from speaking to friends.

Not in good old Blighty. You get clobbered twice. This government stands ABSOLUTELY ZERO chance of being re-elected and they've not even got a year under their belts yet.

Greece doesn’t tax education. It tried, but backtracked after a few months after the EU warned them it was in breach of EU law. VAT on UK school fees is only possible because of Brexit. Without that, we wouldn’t be able to tax education. The irony is that Starmer has said he wants to move closer to the EU, but one of their flagship policies goes directly against that.

Ok that's interesting, thanks.

Exactly this! I wouldn't be so smug just yet.

Yes and not only are they not going to pull their children out mid-year but those who've come to the conclusion that they have to keep paying no matter what, will be cancelling their cleaners, doing their own decorating, not upgrading their cars, not upgrading their iphones, cutting back on takeaways etc. All this stuff impacts on the economy one way or another.

I can't understand why anyone would be gleeful about this? There are private schools closing due to a combination of VAT, additional business rates etc etc. So as well as the children attending those schools having to move, some in important exam years, there are plenty of staff losing jobs. And a lot of the children at private schools are there due to SEN.

I don't have a child at private school, and never have had, but I genuinely can't understand why anyone is pleased about this policy. Apart from jealousy of course

The choice of the word 'gleeful' tells us all we need to know about the motivation behind some people's politics, doesn't it?

Meanwhile, in just about every private school across the land, there is restructuring going on, desperate attempts to make minimal savings to try and future proof the school.....and in some cases, redundancies and therefore staff expected to do more because the work doesn't disappear just because the person doing it is apparently surplus to requirements.

that's ordinary people - some teachers, grounds people, admin staff, kitchen staff, cleaners....all looking at losing at least part of their job, if not the full job. they really deserve it, don't they?

what a spiteful post

Too early to assess impact on private and state numbers. Parents will try to move or enter DC at natural transition points, especially year 7 and sixth form.

As a parent of children in private school, this is really nonsense. Three schools locally are closing at the end of the year, nobody is pulling their kid out mid year. The difference will be from September.

The boundaries for our grammar schools have significantly jumped though, lots of very distressed parents and children who would have normally comfortably got in without places.

Yep, mine is in year 11. They are going to a state 6th form. There’s no way I’d move mid school, or mid way through infant, junior or secondary, but at every junction there’s movement so the impact is less.

We never would have looked if Labour hadn’t been so spiteful.

The state secondary we are going to is oversubscribed so my DC is taking someone’s spot.

Spot on

Do you mean the pass benchmark has now risen as kids who might have gone to private secondary school will now be sitting the 11 plus, thus the threshold will be raised for a place if the overall scores are higher? Which means that other children who may previously have secured a place will now be edged out by children who have been to prep school and/or can have tutors?

Gleeful is a really odd take on it, tbh.

Another thread where the Op posts something to get everyone going then never returns

When my cleaner retired we decided that what we paid her would cover the school fees increase so we haven't replaced her.
Of course we are very lucky to be able to afford Private school and also a cleaner previously and we could afford it now if we really wanted to I suppose. And I don't expect any sympathy for doing my own cleaning, I have done it before and am fine doing it again
So there you go, there is 1 job lost due to this policy, I am sure there are loads more
Gleeful about that OP?

He who laughs last….
You are laughing too early .

Lol! Now we need to worry about impact on hospitality, retail and the whole economy!

This post perfectly embodies the self importance of so many private school parents exhibit. To think they have the power to shrink the economy is laughable. Nearly 70 million people in the country but the parents of maybe 5% of private school kids have that level of influence over the economy.

As someone who is broadly in favour of this policy I'm not gleeful, because I never thought for a moment that there would be a huge exodus from private education, despite the dire warnings of the usual sky-is-falling suspects at the Telegraph. Fees were never going to go up by 20% (because schools can now deduct VAT from most of their costs, other than staff salaries, even before they look to see what they can absorb or cut elsewhere). The cost of private education has been rising faster than inflation for many years now, partly driven by ever more impressive facilities, so maybe by putting off the new swimming pool for a couple of years, ends can be made to meet. Plus, the kinds of parents who care enough about their kids' education to spend X amount are mostly going to be prepared to spend X+12% or whatever.

Also, comparisons with the EU are mostly spurious because almost no children in the EU go to what would be classed as a private school in the UK (i.e., where you pay the full cost of your child's education with no support from the government, while also paying the same taxes as everyone else). Proponents of private schools sometimes trot out statistics about the percentage of French or Dutch children who are "privately" educated, but it's comparing apples with tennis balls because in those countries (and several others), "private" schools are essentially denominational schools — they have a religious affiliation and their notional governing structure is part of a local church, but otherwise they teach exactly the same curriculum, and the state employs the teachers and puts up 99% of the money. DD attended a "private" high school in France for a year (because her two best friends were going there after middle school) and the "fees" we paid for one year were about €150.