If you’re charged VAT will you remove your child from their private school? I’m v stressed!

[Liikklu]

We won’t be able to pay the increase. Only hope is asking grandparents for the shortfall which we don’t want to do. Anyone else in a similar boat? Do you think it will literally be a 20% increase on fees or will schools absorb some of it? Our school has said they will address the matter ‘if and when’ it applies.

I’ve worked as a teacher in a few private schools. Two were struggling financially but we kept going. A surprising number are undersubscribed and desperately keen to keep pupils, although they never tell you that as then they lose their air of being prestigious. I’d imagine that many private schools will first try to absorb it as best they can with things like class size increases, keeping salaries as tightly budgeted as they can, timetabling so the day is a bit shorter, avoiding refurbs, tightening up on photocopying budgets and even removing staff perks such as free biscuits, coffee, health insurance etc. It all mounts up. Class sizes is the obvious way to save money. It might be a couple of years before it starts to bite hard and the fees go up 20%.

Listen if a school is ‘closing’ because of a policy that may or may not come in, from a party who may or may not win an election- then the people running that school are full of shit.
That school will have already been earmarked for closing but this is a nice excuse to lay the blame somewhere else rather than on the institution who haven’t been able to make it financial viable to keep this BUSINESS open. It’s what happens.

or, and perhaps I’m being too cynical, the people of FB are telling porkies for effect and scaremongering.
IF a private school closes parents can A) find another one - I hear there will be lots of places free soon
B) use normal schools like everyone else - also lots of room due to the falling birth rate.

Has the school not contacted parents re possible increase?
dd’s school sent out a survey earlier this year asking how we would be impacted by the potential increase. School has now confirmed that the full 20% would not be passed on to parents in year one and would be phased in. This is a private school in south west (fees £15k for sixth form) and not full of mega wealthy families. DD’s friends’ parents work at the university/ legal/ teachers etc.
it won’t affect us as dd is in upper sixth, but if she were in lower sixth we would have continued to pay the fees.

Bit harsh. 🫣

My kids are both moving into exam years from September and I have my fingers crossed that we don't have a bunch of dispossessed local ex-private kids looking lost and soaking up teaching resources to their detriment.

@aiak

id love to hear his reply to your post! It'll all be absolute garbage of course, but I'd like to see him TRY to answer that.

The Oratory is socially mixed, even if religiously homogeneous. Unlike many religions, Catholics come from all over the world and london’s Catholic schools will have children whose backgrounds are Eastern European, African, southern Europe, Filipino.. They also come from wide distances in London, north and south.
I don’t know what school Starmer sends his kids to - nor should I - but again Kentish Town/Islington is also very mixed. There is no state school that is only middle class that I can think of.
Re: VAT, the detail will be everything. Most of a private school’s expenses are salary related so won’t attract VAT. So my guess is that the max increase will be 10%.

Schools are doing a lot behind the scenes - if yours has a decent SLT then they will have been planning for some time. A lot depends on the size and financial stability of the individual schools. Mine for example ( big, city independent 4-18) will not pass on all of the fee increase to parents. It’s the double whammy of the rise in pension contributions this year with this that makes it so tricky. They can’t respond because it may not happen immediately, it could be phased in, the major teaching unions are against it, as are many state school heads. It’s difficult to know exactly what’s going to happen.

@Dibblydoodahdah

yes, doesn't it just!!

& too daft to see the situation this will put many kids in the state school too!

Listen if a school is ‘closing’ because of a policy that may or may not come in, from a party who may or may not win an election- then the people running that school are full of shit.

I've googled the school and it took kids from 1-18 but only had 350 of them. It was a tiny school. They hired a new headteacher to try to increase pupil numbers but it didn't work.

I don't think a proposed policy under a future Labour government was why that school wasn't financially viable, but it would certainly suit some to pretend that it was.

I teach in a secondary where even after VAT was abolished on sanitary products I regularly have to buy my students tampons, so forgive me if I don't g8ve a fuck about your privilege.

I imagine it will be phased in so won’t be a sudden 20% hit to parents.

I will say though in our area an unpopular school became very good when a new posh estate was built nearby - within a couple of years and a very good head, it is now outstanding. An influx of ‘keen’ parents for want of a better phrase, lead to higher numbers, better funding and a better school for all students. Long term this policy could work well - and that is the point surely

Finding pleasure in other people’s misery is a vile trait. There are many people who have previously moved their DC from state schools because they were not being supported and are extremely worried about having to move them back. The OP was asking for support but you chose to come on this thread and be unpleasant. What does that say about you?

Maybe the school would have failed anyway, but this VAT policy has been around for a while and has been causing concern amongst parents I know. People have already started making decisions based on it, with many more pupils leaving at the end of year 6 this term than would usually.

Starmer's kids apparently attended Eleanor Palmer Primary School. They don't go there any more as they are teens so not sure why the identity of that school should bother anyone.

London Oratory gets lots to Oxbridge. Say anything you like about it, but that alone shows what a fantastic school it is and the Oxbridge admission stats are hard facts. I believe at least one of Blair's kids went to Oxford and at least one had paid private tutoring.

These labour MPs have gamed everything to their own advantage, whilst pretending that they are there for the poor man.

I'm no tory. Didn't vote for Bojo. But to ignore this raging hypocrisy is rather short sighted.

It'll be hard. We've been trying to save ever since Labour started floating the idea, but going to struggle regardless. Of course this is MN with its absolute contempt for private schools.

I would ask grandparents to help. Are you coming up to the end or at the very start of primary school? We're already getting grandparent help with half the fees, so less of a hit to come up with another potential 4k or whatever rather then 8k, of course, but it will still be v. difficult. We don't have long to go, so it's worth sticking it out. Unhelpfully, both kids are headed towards a-level subjects that are not offered in any state schools in our part of the country.

Honestly, grandparents would be my first port of call here if you're just looking at a couple of years. I kind of think that if you're at the very start of secondary school here though, if the VAT is wiping you out now, you are unlikely to be able to cope with the steady fee increases you're going to be looking at over the next 12 years, and it could be that bowing out gracefully might be your best option, and putting the money towards tutors, extracurriculars etc.

My children are all at State schools but your tone is just so mean and says so much about you and your envy. Why bother posting?

If you've got nothing nice to say...

Agree with this. No advice to those stressing out, but mn isn’t likely to help much unfortunately

Don’t vote Labour, and ask your family to not vote Labour is an option to also pursue. From a purely objective view.

Then why the hell do they keep clicking on the threads to comment??

Why can't the non private school people just stay on the relationship or chat or sex boards.

I don't even have children at private school but I can't falthom the spiteful attitudes on here right now.

It's not the fault of private school parents that your students don't have tampons. It's the fault of their own parents and you should take it up with them. Presumably this is not an isolated tragic situation affecting one student if you are regularly doing it for many - lots of parents are failing their kids. I expect the parents would tell you to fuck off, like they did to my brother (teacher) when he phoned up to try to help the kids attend maths lessons, rather than skive them and damage property.

Just wanted to say OP, that I and my two siblings were moved from a very expensive private school to a quite a rough state school when my parents got divorced and it was surprisingly fine. We all made friends (that we still have now), did well in our exams and are financially successful. I know this is only anecdotal but if it ends up being the worst case scenario where you cannot afford the fees, it won’t be the end of the world.

It's not the fault of private school parents that your students don't have tampons. It's the fault of their own parents and you should take it up with them. Presumably this is not an isolated tragic situation affecting one student if you are regularly doing it for many - lots of parents are failing their kids. I expect the parents would tell you to fuck off, like they did to my brother (teacher) when he phoned up to try to help the kids attend maths lessons, rather than skive them and damage property

Are you for real?

@Thegreatergoodgerald of course they don’t care. That’s why I asked those who were in the same position as us. Thanks for your helpful post, though!