Vat Question????????

[Anoth]

Can I ask a silly question??
We have been given our school fees for 24/25 academic year now for the school my daughter attends.
My question is if labours policy comes in half way through an academic year will the schools be allowed to put the fees up for the remainder of that academic year? Eg if we start paying X amount on September and then labour get in and introduce the added vat in October. Will the fees go up in Jan of that academic year? Normally fees remain un changed for the whole of the academic year once fees have been published but I understand this is a strange situation!
Just wanted to know if I need to prepare to save more for 24/25 fees just in case or will these that are now published still remain until the end of July 25??.
Thanks!

@Another76543 i was merely quoting a PP’s description of gilded elites who’s imminent decampment to Switzerland foretells the fall of Albion.

I never said it is just the VAT on school fees, it is the combination of high taxes, extortionate house prices/rents, poor health care, increasingly insular mindset/toxic politics and now also less educational choice. People stayed for the schools primarily, if you take that away there is not much left. So I believe younger millennials and below will be getting out if they can.

I think this is the point people don’t understand. It will be the final straw for a lot of people. What’s the point in working harder and harder to have yet more taken away? I truly hope my children leave the UK in favour of another country which will value them more.

That's the thing about a country where the majority seek not to pay for anything themselves but instead to "tax the rich". It looks pretty stupid without "the rich".

When people say "oh but Finland" they sometimes don't notice that Finland taxes lower and middle earners way more than we do.

Income tax on (say) the top third can raise several times the £1.5bn. Or if you just raise the £1.5bn nobody would even notice. And you would be raising money from "the rich" who benefit from free taxpayer-funded education.

Meanwhile even the IFS and OBR already said the 50pc tax rate was revenue neutral for exactly the same reasons we are saying here. People withdraw labour, move abroad and do things differently. Now we have a 60pc rate from 100 to 125k plus the withdrawal of childcare.

I am in agreement with you on this but where would you suggest they go?

Poor healthcare, high house prices, it's becoming incredibly difficult for younger people to carve out a decent life in the UK. So much needs to change.
However, VAT on private schools does not even feature in most people's day to day life.

@SomersetBrie - you are forgetting that in areas of high house prices like London it was often cheaper to pay up 11-16 than to move because stamp duty is extortionate. Moreover, whilst I have managed to get all 4 DC a great state education it required almost an expert type knowledge in school admissions and also meant we could never move and are stuck in one place. This leads to less flexibility and productivity. We literally cannot change jobs easily.

We pay eye watering amounts of tax but not rich enough for private school not to hurt (and no family money). Where we moved was largely predicated on good state schools. If we’re paying for them with our taxes reluctant to then pay again for private school. The private schools are probably “better” but it’s pretty marginal here.

I'm not sure what part of my post you are responding to? I haven't said anything about anyone changing jobs.

And when I referred to Switzerland it was a reference to a family member in IT and wife in pharma with 2 young boys. It wasn’t a reference to some super elite non dom with a tax deal with some small canton.

They moved to the outskirts of Zurich a few years ago and were given state school places immediately (someone in the council literally had a long conversation with them about their needs and they had a contact!) and tailored language immersion classes in school by the council. Both boys were fluent in a few months. Said cousin works in an international environment and had some language skills but basic only. They were going to come back but are not anymore. They say their rent is stable, landlord can only raise it in line with interest rates, they won’t get kicked out, one child has a health issue that is amazingly well taken care of there too so no long queues etc. missing school. Uni is virtually free too.

I suspect if you move to Finland or Norway the same would be true. There is just much more support and emphasis in these countries on young professionals and their children thriving. They are the bedrock of society and the future. All the U.K. has going for it now is great online shopping, free top museums and some good culture. The rest is a nightmare. Our politicians are just focussed on keeping the elderly generation happy. There is no plan for the future. There seems to be no real planning full stop. Just reactive and petty culture wars.

Tax in Norway is insane though isn’t it?! Someone has to pay for all these lovely things

@TheaBrandt - no, tax in Norway at professional level is pretty much the same and sometimes less because you have deductions. Same applies to eg Zurich. Zurich has quite high tax rates and so does Geneva but you get deductions if you have children. Your overall wealth is taken into account. You are treated more like a mini company.
So here high earners with no wealth are screwed. There is no acknowledgement whatsoever in taxation here of local cost of living.

@SomersetBrie “However, VAT on private schools does not even feature in most people's day to day life.”
It does for young professionals who cannot afford to move house due to huge stamp duty so often they will pay up for ages 11-15 (state Sixth Form is then selective so catchment becomes less of an issue). It is probably also the exact same bracket on the high marginal tax rates x 2.

I can think of a few countries I’d choose over the UK. Friends and family are moving to places such as Europe, Dubai, China, USA. These were all high tax payers here. I don’t know why so many people are intent on driving the high tax payers away.

it's becoming incredibly difficult for younger people to carve out a decent life in the UK

Absolutely. For us, VAT on school fees signals that the plan is to keep taxing “the rich” and taking more and more. “The rich” often aren’t multi millionaires, but simply hard workers who’ve slogged for years to improve their life. They’ve often got lots of qualifications and other countries would welcome them with open arms.

What will be next? When does it stop? Health care, care homes? It’s not the VAT situation on its own. It’s everything else alongside it. The UK is increasingly taking more and more from net contributors but we see nothing for it. It’s not improving the country.

The choice at the General Election is to either vote for the status quo (hardly tempting) or vote for the alternative which in my opinion will be even worse. What a sorry state of affairs.

Most people, I said.
Less than 10% of the population go to private school.

https://taxsummaries.pwc.com/norway/individual/taxes-on-personal-income

I’m not a Norwegian tax expert, and I know there are various deductions available, but on the face of it, it looks like the tax burden is spread more evenly. Average earners pay more tax than they would in the UK. Higher earners don’t.

This is the point. You can’t keep taking more and more from the top few percent of earners. It doesn’t work. The only way of receiving a meaningful increase in tax is to tax more of the population a higher rate.

https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5801/cmselect/cmtreasy/664/66408.htm

• a 1p increase in the basic rate of income tax would raise £5.5bn in 2022/23 (0.2% of GDP), and a 1p increase in the higher rate would raise £1.3bn in 2022/23 (0.1% of GDP);

Higher earners are usually the most economically mobile and most desirable to other countries, and will simply leave the UK when their tax burden reaches a certain level.

It’s 20% at 6th form level. A much higher percentage of people have used private school at some point in time than many people realise.

Europe is great, better if you speak the language, I have spent time living there.
I wouldn't consider Dubai or China for ethical reasons. USA not a great place to bring up kids right now. But you might know better if they are attractive to the highest earners, I am not in that category myself.

I honestly don't care if the VAT drives some high tax payers away, I think it's important to spend time working in other countries, it opens people's minds and horizons. It might also mean a different government as these are the people more likely to vote Tory.

There are loads of people with excellent qualifications who went to state schools, maybe it will be their time to shine.

Have you spent time working abroad? It's a terrific experience and I really hope that my kids take that chance.

I’m using anecdotal examples of friends who’ve moved abroad recently and giving examples of where they’ve moved to.

I honestly don't care if the VAT drives some high tax payers away

The tax receipts will be harmed by them moving though. Someone needs to pay for public services and higher tax payers contribute a huge amount.

Have you spent time working abroad?

Yes. It showed me how easy it was to move abroad and that other countries welcome us. Added to that, our tax burden in that country was far less than here.

“There are loads of people with excellent qualifications who went to state schools, maybe it will be their time to shine.”

I have never ever heard a Spanish, French or German person say something like this, even though they also have a similar percentage of private schools.

I have also lived and worked in several countries, speak 5 languages, have 3 passports. What school my DCs went to was never going to define their privilege. They could have gone to the worst school locally and still be more privileged than many many children across the country in smaller private schools. As if schooling was ever the whole picture. I think it is this falsehood some posters are objecting to. This huge public lie that somehow private schools are to blame just like the EU was to blame. What a mess!

In fact, I was reading about some state schools Eton is trying to partner with in the Midlands and the North and some outrage about how they are spreading privilege. Why is there such disdain for aspiration in this country? Please could someone explain this to me. I am born British but abroad so I just cannot understand it.

My sister-in-law and family earn about the same as me and Mrs Chips. They spent seven years in Dubai and came back with their school fees tucked away. Cost to HMRC, some £hundreds of thousands.

"I honestly don't care if the VAT drives some high tax payers away". Bonkers. There's some story about golden eggs and a goose...does anyone remember that one?

“My sister-in-law and family earn about the same as me and Mrs Chips. They spent seven years in Dubai and came back with their school fees tucked away. Cost to HMRC, some £hundreds of thousands.”

@MisterChips - for now, people are still coming back for the superior private education in UK. However, the educational billionaire groups in places like Dubai are going all out courting British private schools for tips and partnerships to make sure their offering will rival the quality, if not surpass it, in the future. And the Labour Party are playing right into their hands.

Some of the decent private schools are also now expanding their brand overseas. Even schools which hadn’t been considering doing so are now exploring it further.

@Another76543 - they are doing this to raise cash to mitigate the direct attack on them by the Labour Party. Obviously they are going to try and protect their teaching staff/community by raising funds to mitigate the effects of losing substantial amounts of pupils.

There was no investigation by the IFS into the soft power and potential geopolitical issues with pushing UK private schools abroad either. Caution should be exercised especially in regards to certain jurisdictions. I am sure MI6 would agree.