Michael Gove proposes imposing VAT on private school fees

[OCSockOrphanage]

In an Op Ed piece for The Times today (Fri 24 Feb), teaching's Nemesis suggests that school fees should be subject to VAT at 20% so the revenue can be ploughed into improving state provision.

Link

Opinions? I reckon there will be a few?

This would not affect the super rich elite but the people like us who do without certain luxuries and work very hard to send our DD Private ( not suggesting that parents with dc at State schools don't work hard too).
We could probably manage a 20% increase but many couldn't so places would have to be found for all those children. We turned down a State Grammar place for DD as did a couple of other parents I know with their children at Private School. We have the resources and will to push for our DC to get Grammar places and if we had to we would have pushed out some children who's parents were banking on Grammar and couldn't afford Private. Grammar schools would become even more inaccessible for poorer bright children.
Some of our taxes presumably fund education so we are paying twice already. If they want us to pay VAT on school fees I would like my money back that I am contributing to other children's State education please.

The economics of Gove's attention seeking article don't even stack up. At the moment, private schools do not claim back input tax as this relates to "exempt supplies". If school fees were standard rated, they would be able to offset input VAT, to the extent it related to those "supplies, so any VAT paid over would be very much reduced. Coupled with a vast number of children leaving the private sector due to parents not being able to afford an increase in fees, this would lead to increased burden on the public sector and unemployment of lots of teachers in the private sector (as well as reduction in employment taxes from those teachers and schools)

engineersthumb I hate posts like yours that belittle children and call them 'Tristram' etc.
It's pathetic.

I have two dc in state and one in private. Yes I am saving the government a massive amount of money. My dd2 has ASD and I pay for all her support that is an extra on top of the allocated state amount.

Plus we are net contributors to the system, unlike most people.

Don't have a huge problem with it providing there's a corresponding income tax rebate. Same goes for healthcare. Neither state provision is,adequate imo - both are necessities rather than luxuries.

This is just Gove trying to get noticed again. It's not as if he did much good to education last time he had influence over it. He seems to enjoy making a mess of things by making massive, swift and ill thought out changes based on no evidence.

What an odious pest.

I went to a UK college that charged VAT on the fees
but the rules changed a few years later.

Gove needs to read a lot more charity law before his article makes any sense.

Of course it wont. It will only impact the middle classes. But maybe this is the solution to state ed, drive the MC back to it let them become involved in state schools; run PTS's, become school governors etc.

Exactly - that sounds like a great plan