Private school fees

[studentandparent]

Labour will scrap charitable status on private school fees when next in Government. Anyone got any idea how much this will increase fees?

Labour 'policy' of imposing VAT is an example of how good these head lines are at polarizing the electorate but also how little people understand what they mean in practice

But is it a Labour policy?

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4258440/Fury-Gove-s-calls-20-VAT-private-school-fees.html

Agree with this because they want everyone to finish the race at the same time, even if that means we all come last?

At least the last Labour gov under Blair had the sense not to destroy what the U.K. is good at and draws us overseas talent.

This Labour go for petty meanness votes that make no financial sense, so depressing.

@socialmedia23 I honestly have no idea about religious needs in education. We both attended very strict Roman Catholic schools. I’m no educational expert I don’t work in education. But I’m a parent of three children now in secondary school. The area we live in is very affluent there are a number of outstanding secondary and primary schools, Grammar and private schools. Competition to get into all of them is fierce and they are all oversubscribed. The property prices around the top performing secondary are eye watering even for here.
We have friends with children in grammar, state secondary, both faith and non faith, and private. I have a friend and a relative who teaches in a very good local private school. The difference in the quality of education at those schools is great.
the question is why should I continue to help fund that education for the privately educated ? On top of our mortgage and our tax. Why? How on earth does that be fit us and our children?

@RenovatingEdwardianhouse your not subsidising it. It would cost the taxpayer more for those private school children to be in state schools. Why can’t you understand that?

Private schools exist in every country. The difference in the UK is that people believe that they will gain an advantage from attending private school- whether its academic, social, or in terms of better facilities and extra-curricular. Hence they pay the fees. Its supply and demand- if there was no demand for private schools (other than niche ones like international schools or for very specific religious communities or bohemian hippie ones like steiner schools), we would not be having this conversation. fundamentally, we are a free society and that includes the freedom to educate our children as we see fit.

The solution is to make state schools more attractive so it would only be foreigners looking for the Mallory Towers experience or the eccentric who consider private schools an option. This would make education more egalitarian. It would possibly have the effect of making grammar schools more difficult to get in; if you look at the list of state schools with higher oxbridge admission rates, almost all are state selective colleges or grammar schools. Catchment areas will also shrink. 67% of successful Oxbridge applicants are now from state schools, so now the Oxbridge advantage of private school is shrinking which I suppose is positive. I think a lot of parents still opt for private schools though because for many, the grandparents are paying and its a 'cultural thing' i.e. i went to private school and so my son/daughter must go too. Some also choose to go for SEN needs (so if the state improved on that, there would be no need to go). Same for extra curriculars (though I suppose it must be cheaper to do that all externally rather than pay for private school). Lastly, based on my experience, a lot of people i know who opt for private school do so because they don't live in catchment for a top state secondary.

Top UK State Schools for Oxbridge offers (2020-22)
School UK County Oxbridge offers (2022) Oxbridge offers (2021) Oxbridge offers (2020)
Hills Road Sixth Form College Cambridge 69 75
Peter Symonds College Hampshire 44 56 54
Brampton Manor Academy London 54 51
Brighton Hove and Sussex Sixth Form Sussex 52 55
Colchester Royal Grammar Essex N/A 39
Henrietta Barnet College London 30 36
St Olave's & St Savior's London 37 28
Runshaw College Lancashire 35 22
Winstanley College Greater Manchester 31 23
Woodhouse College London 27 28
Greenhead College West Yorkshire 24 40
Hereford Sixth Form College Herefordshire 20 22 31

Private schools are businesses and should be treated as such.

There isn't really any argument to continue charitable status, Sunak put it better "There will be hard choices"

Poor parents wont be able to afford it? rubbish, the fee's involved are way beyond anyone even on a 100k, a mortgage and with two children... average day fees per year are 15k, so 30k plus all the extras.

That's over half take home pay & tbf after having had a small amount of involvement with a school in Somerset, i doubt anyone there wasn't on far more than 100k p.a.

I tell my son he’s my Porsche!!

my DH went to 'private school' when he was a kid. It was an ultra orthodox Jewish school in Stamford Hill. They don't charge very much. But its still considered private as its not funded by the state.

Even for regular private schools. Not everyone has two children. Some have grandparents who help. There are bursaries which would be cut back on if there was this policy. There are often posts by Mumsnetters here with combined income of £100k who are considering private school and that is not a high income in the SE at all. Not everyone has the same mortgage and particularly for those who bought a while back and had children late, they may be mortgage free and can plough £2k into fees every month that would have gone on the mortgage.

The thing is, I reckon some fee rises are going to happen regardless, at least at some schools. It's been well publicised how much energy bills are going up for state schools- I would imagine they will be going up equivalent amounts at many private schools. And they will be getting no government help to pay these bills.

Many state school teachers will also be getting a pay rise this year (more if the strikes are successful). IME, teachers won't take a pay cut to go private, so in some cases, private schools may have to pay more to attract staff (before anyone says it, I know some pay more anyway). As staff in some subjects (e.g. physics) become rarer and rarer, private schools will have to pay more to attract them, too.

Plus general inflation at 10.1% will be having an impact, especially after Covid, which has been difficult for some private schools.

Maybe fees won't go up 20%, but equally some larger private schools could absorb some of the VAT hit for parents too. But I'm expecting to see some private schools pushed over the edge anyway, this year + some parents having to make the difficult decision to withdraw their children (or deciding they can't afford it in the first place).

So if this is happening anyway (which I think it will), then the government getting some revenue to help out state schools is a better outcome, regardless.

People saying that parents will just buy up houses in the best catchment areas:

1. Some schools do lottery admissions now, so this doesn't help.
2. That doesn't help you get an in year place.
3. There may not necessarily be houses available if people aren't selling.

There is a sense of entitlement on this thread that some people can just buy their way out of "poor" state schools. If that were changed, I do think the quality of education overall in this country will go up.

They don't need a house, when i was buying my first flat, i almost bought a woman who bought a 2 bed flat in the catchment of Fortismere School in North London to get her child in. She owned a 4 bed house in the same borough! But in a less middle class part! She had to sell because she got made redundant but her child was safely settled in fortismere and she bought it less than 3 years ago so could claim back the stamp duty!

She got questioned by Haringey Council but she got over the line. Money does help.

Oh and she kept the 4 bed house empty while she and her daughter lived in the 2 bed flat. they only went back for her to have her piano lessons on the grand piano there.

Talking of fees maybe rising anyway given the current climate. One private school teacher friend has just been forced to take a pay cut. The school don’t want to pass the increased costs they are facing on to customers so the staff have borne the brunt. The friend is a head of department has been at the school for years.
ans for this making the argument that state school parents don’t fund private school tax relief.
we pay tax it provides a substandard education. Our school does not get any tax relief.
you pay tax for an optimal education the company providing it gets tax relief. That tax relief equates to a very large amount of tax not going into the public purse via government. Money that could be spent on better provision for all schools.

the fact if average child’s school being kept short of cash that could be injected into the system, if proper tax was paid is ok it seems for many contributors to this thread. As long as their child is able to continue at private school with no increased fee.

you are part of a community, the business that provides your chairs is part of a community is must contribute financially like the rest of us do, or we all are subsidising you.

Excuse my spelling it’s been a long day.

But there are dreadful private schools and outstanding state schools. I don't really understand the correlation. We don't pay tax cos we hope we can benefit from all the provisions that the state provides. I don't have a child yet so don't benefit from schools. but i still want good education as it benefits society if people are well educated

Private doesn't equate to quality. In fact i would make a controversial statement and say that unless you are sending your child to a private school with specific ethos that correspond to niche requirements i.e. international school, school with specific outlook or religious ethos that is not available on the state sector or a absolutely top private school with amazing grades i.e. City of London, Habs, St Paul's, North London Collegiate, Highgate Channing, Wycombe Abbey, its a waste of money.Or your child has some very specific talent and the private school is absolutely key to their development i.e. choir school etc. Many would not agree.

@Lozzybear You are assuming all parents of kids in private schools are going to put them into state schools. In reality a small number of parents will, that is fine. The rest should not be sub

🤣

In the town I grew up in during the 1970s, the best performing school in the area by a long shot was the grammar school. It had a very high percentage of Oxbridge entrants every year. Every parent wanted their DC to pass the 11+ so they could attend the grammar school. The only parents who went private were those whose DC failed to get into grammar. Then, if they could afford it, the DCs went to one of the two private schools that cultivated their strengths in sports, arts and music rather than attending one of the local secondary schools whose curriculum was tailored towards learning trades, typing skills, nursing and needlework, etc. Everyone knew that the pupils at the private schools were not very academic and they were definitely not competing for university places.

The point of this is, that if the state system was good enough (as it was where/when I went to school) then there is little need for private schools. Surely the aim should be to make the state schools better than the private schools so they naturally disappear. This can only be achieved through much better funding - perhaps state schools should set themselves up as charities and start crowdfunding!

Schools should not be charities. Charities should be for the extras not for basic state support.

@antelopevalley no, I wasn’t. I was looking it at an individual level. No individual pupil is being subsidised because of the saving to the tax payer of them not being education in the state system. What you’re actually wanting is for private school parents to pay more tax than they already do so that they’re subsidising the state system even more than they already are. Be truthful and stop pretending that the state is subsidising private schools when it’s the exact opposite!

@RenovatingEdwardianhouse please do tell us exactly how much extra tax it’s going to generate given that you’re such an expert.

If anyone wonders why private schools churn out students with amazing grades, guess what, it's because they select the brightest children to begin with.

There is a sense of entitlement on this thread that some people can just buy their way out of "poor" state schools. If that were changed, I do think the quality of education overall in this country will go up.
It's not a sense of entitlement. It's a reality in many areas.

Lots of areas don't do lottery systems and to be honest I understand why many parents wouldn't want their child having to commute several busses on public transport Vs going to the school within walking distance. Or there's considerable expense bussing thousands of children around a county on funded school transport when many could walk or cycle to several closer schools.

It's not unreasonable for parents to want their children to go to a decent school where they are safe and can achieve. Some parents in my area opting to privately educate their children isn't the reason some local schools are awful at the moment.

lbnblbnb how are you subsidising private education?

I am paying tax and school fees so surely I am paying for two educations. How are you subsidising me?

We would use the local state school but it is dire (no science teacher for the last 2 years, sport is non existent, Head Teacher is a total moron, maths is dire) etc.

And how do I know this? A friend of mine sends her kids there and is moving them out one by one for a private school. Ok so I could become and governor and turn it all around ? Tried that at the primary school and it was a total closed shop and was a nightmare so quit after a year. Could try another state school? We are in the nearest sticks so next nearest school is 20 miles away. Try a grammar school - its 30 miles away...

I would say 30-50% of private school kids are in private schools because the state schools don't meet their needs. We could wait for the labour party to come and rescue us all but how long would this turn around take? New teachers, new facilities - you're talking years not months. Meanwhile kids need an education.

My kids school is non-selective. They still get great grades. Because small class sizes, increased enrichment opportunities and teachers who are valued and supported and not over worked. A teacher with 15 kids can give each child more individualized attention and support than if you have 30+. The state system simply isn't good enough for ANY child. It needs serous investment and overhauling.

@Badnewsoracle there is another point which is that even with the non selective private schools, parents who can afford the fees tend to be brighter and their children are also brighter as a result, on average. Hence better grades than in state schools. There has been plenty of research to support this thesis.