Thread 2: VAT on school Fees- High court challenge

[EHCPerhaps]

Following on from thread 1
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/education/5160565-vat-on-school-fees-high-court-challenge

Background to legal challenge (not yet a case):
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13824931/amp/Single-mother-autistic-child-launches-High-Court-challenge-Labours-private-schools-VAT-raid-claiming-violates-daughters-right-education.html

Sorry to begin a new thread, OP, but your thread filled up very quickly!

Demand so much in return? This has to be a joke. The majority of us don’t mind paying huge amounts of tax. We don’t mind paying for private services where the state has failed to provide an alternative. What we do mind is being hit with a tax penalty for using a private service where the state provision is inadequate.

We paid for private pre school because the state funded alternative was dire. We paid for private primary because the catchment was dreadful (ofsted have said that over the last few years “pupils did not achieve well”). We are now paying private secondary fees (the local catchment school doesn’t even music GCSE for a musical child and sport is very limited). We have always paid for private dentistry because the NHS offering is non existent. We are paying for private orthodontic work because the wait for the NHS is over 2 years even for an initial appointment. We have private health insurance because the NHS isn’t fit for puroose (we tried the NHS route for a particular issue and were failed miserably so ended up down the private route). We are paying for all of this out income which has already been heavily taxed. All of this should be provided by the state. There are huge amounts of money poured into state services which don’t function properly. It’s a disgrace that the population has to put up with this level of state funded services.

To say that high rate taxpayers demand so much is beyond ridiculous. Many of us have reached a point where we have simply had enough of paying so much and constantly told we have to pay even more. Enough is enough.

Demand so much in return?

This is why Labour’s rhetoric is problematic, it fosters this belief and we see bad policy with poor outcomes for everyone

‘Who is it you think is not happy with their tax money going towards state education that they don’t use?’

er, well that will be the many, many, MANY private school parents on threads on VAT claiming that they save tax payers money, or that they’re being ‘double’ taxed or that the government should give them back the £7k odd or whatever it is they’ve worked out a child cost to state educate… them. Those people.
The ones who believe that they’re being discriminated against in some way for having tax breaks taken away from a luxury

A lot of higher rate tax payers here are only looking at half the picture.

For starters, fiscal, monetary, housing and immigration policy need to be looked at holistically. The ultra low interest rates and QE ended up as a massive tax on the worse off (inflation way above pay increases) but a huge boon for the asset rich (including anyone with a significant pension). Not building enough houses and encouraging low wage immigration has also hit the poor hard while keeping all wage costs low (cleaner, nanny etc).

No CGT on primary residence is a massive tax break for generational wealth, especially if it is stored in bricks and mortar.

As for the 2008 banking bailout, the (temporary) socialism within finance was a massive boon for those working in it (and even employed subsequently) at huge salaries (a LOT of private school parents) at a tax burden to those far less well off.

So I take with a massive pinch of salt those who consider their wealth is purely earned via their talent and that they basically pay high taxes through the goodness of their heart rather than emigrating to a low tax regime.

As for private schooling, it is particularly divisive in the uk, which is still emerging from the old class system. Most private school parents (as in greater than 50%, probably a fair bit greater) never considered state schooling at all, it is not something they are familiar with and it is, to them, like the old maps-‘there be dragons’!

You cannot compare the way the school system is here to private schools in the states or Europe. How often, outside the uk, are people asked what school they went to?

I am agnostic on VAT and don’t think it should be rushed in, because it is unfair to penalise children, but the absolute horror some view it with on here is risible.

OK. We didn't mind our tax money going towards state education that we don’t use. And paying huge amounts when so many other people take handouts.

Until we were deliberately hit with a punitive tax for populist hate reasons. Until we were told that the huge amounts we've always been happy to pay still weren't enough, and our children were going to be punished for having 'too good' an education.

Like pps, I'm now looking at it with fresh eyes and it's bullshit.

Oh, and education still isn't a luxury, no matter how many times you say it.

And it's still not a tax break to not impose tax on education - like everyone else in the world.

@strawberrybubblegum ,

‘Oh, and education still isn't a luxury, no matter how many times you say it.’

But that is like saying a handbag or pen isn’t a luxury.

No, it isn’t, but a Hermes handbag or Montblanc pen are.

I guess you could argue they should only tax the luxury element, the fees above what it costs to be educated in the state sector……

Why should the state be the arbiter of what level of education is sufficient?

I feel like you’re really struggling with this:

School age children are mandated by law to be in full time education.

The average cost per annum to state to educate a child at state school is £7k.

The average cost per annum to the state to educate a child at private school is £0.

I’m sure you can work this out on your own but just in case, this is a Net benefit to the state per annum per private school educated child of £7k on average.

Total annual net benefit to the state of £4 billion

Hope this helps.

@strawberrybubblegum ,

‘Why should the state be the arbiter of what level of education is sufficient?’

They are on every other requirement in life for taxes and benefits. Why would education be the one exception?

Because it’s protected by the ECHR.

VAT isn’t a tax on luxury. It’s irrelevant anyway because a decent education should never be seen as a luxury. Many private schools are not like the ones portrayed by media outlets and the Labour Party. They are very normal, in old buildings, with no flash facilities. The only “luxury” element is having a slightly smaller class size which means that children get a bit more attention. What is “luxurious” about a child getting a bit of attention from a teacher?

I haven’t seen a single poster saying they are unhappy about paying into a state education system they don’t use. They are not happy about being hit with a tax penalty for not using that system. The fact remains that privately educated children save the taxpayer money. That’s not an opinion; it’s fact.

Just out of interest, are you in favour of the school you went to being a factor in university and graduate schemes applications as I was under the impression this was now deemed desirable by supporters of the education tax (see thread)

I have no doubt that Green and his ilk are fully aware of the points that I made - it would be more forgivable if they weren't.

This is not "research", as you quaintly put it. All state schools are not the same and private schools are not necessarily better. There is real peer reviewed research that shows that Green's "common sense" evidence, that private schools' apparent attainment advantage is due to greater resources, is in fact nonsense. Even in a parallel universe if it were true, increasing the proportion of children in the former from 93% to 93.35% would not make them more equal. It is a document that strives to justify an endpoint that is political rather than rational.

For that reason these ideologues can't make up their minds about how to sell it. For Green, a large as possible shift in numbers is desirable to achieve "educational equality". For HM Gov a small shift in numbers is what we need to raise revenue. The consequences don't matter.

Underpinning it is an ecological fallacy that is diametrically opposite to "how contextual offers work at the moment", which as far as possible, are based on judgements that have been made on an individual level.

"“To the privileged, equality feels like oppression.” and all that." Equality? You mean putting a tax on the education of some children and not others? Elite universities going out of their way to recruit poorer performing students because they went to the "right sort" of school. I'm sorry you will have to explain that.

"Most people believe that society as a whole is better if everyone is given a decent chance, and everyone has a chance to succeed despite their environment as well as because of it." So what do you want equality - or a meritocracy? You do realise you can't have both?

In that case it is certainly a luxury to be educated at the state's expense at a top quintile comprehensive school or a grammar school, most of which are run by private entities and are not accessible to families that are unable to afford catchment area premiums or private tutoring.

85% of the wealthiest 5% of people in the country use these schools, and there are a lot more children in them than there are in private schools. Tax them for their luxury education.

The state (and the courts as part of that) is already the arbiter of education for those having provision made via EHCPs since the law doesn’t require the LA to provide the best possible education.

Those supporting this VAT on Education of the old school Labour thinking - are you happy that this will indirectly lead to the Tories/Reform doing away with the Human Rights Act full stop?
Is it not obvious to you that your actions are leading straight down that path?!

The state is the arbiter of what level of education is sufficient to fulfil the entitlement a student has to education at the state's expense.

However it is not the arbiter of what education is appropriate for a parent to provide at their own expense - in line with the parents' own convictions - to which the student has an ECHR right to non-interference by the state.

Hence my post saying “for those having provision made via EHCPs”. If parents are making their own arrangements, the child or YP isn’t having provision made via an EHCP.

People seem to get confused between:

a) the education which the state is required to provide and fund for a student

versus

b) the student's right not to have their (otherwise funded) education interfered with by the state

So they try to use the gotcha of saying that there are limits to what the state will provide (a) (often related to an EHCP) as a way to deny (b)

@Marchesman ,

‘In that case it is certainly a luxury to be educated at the state's expense at a top quintile comprehensive school or a grammar school, most of which are run by private entities and are not accessible to families that are unable to afford catchment area premiums or private tutoring.’

That is a weird way of looking at it!

Those schools are still providing education on pretty much the same budget as any other state school, around £7,000/annum (some have small parental voluntary contributions but those, by law, can’t be used for core education).

They still teach in class sizes of 30 and have far fewer staff than private, and the teachers are worked far harder in terms of contact time, so they have many more pupils per teacher.

If you really view those as luxury, you have to ask yourself why most private schools need to charge 3x as much, other than for a genuinely luxury component.

That doesn’t apply to my post so I’m not sure why you have quoted my post.

I do believe in a meritocracy. Private school is the opposite of that. People chances are determined by their parents' ability to pay.

You may not class your children's education as a luxury in terms of facilities or buildings. You may be just in it for the smaller class sizes.

But do you know what luxury those smaller classes also have? No poor kids. Apart from the 1% who are on 100% means tested benefits. Even the ones who you don't consider 'wealthy' have enough spare cash to pay the rest of the fees, and enough priorities, drive and resolve to make it work.

So your kids don't have the educated alongside those who are going to food banks, who are coming to school without breakfast, or in dirty clothes, or who have chaotic and dysfunctional lives. Sure, there may be a bit of dysfunction but not nearly on the same scale.

Your children have the luxury of not knowing those other children exist, or living alongside them, unless they happen to volunteer at a foodbank for their DofE.

That's the bit you don't want to say out loud but it is there for all to see. I don't blame you but don't dress it up as a virtue.

@Another76543 you could make those choices to pay your way out of those dire state schools, other people cannot. That's not your fault, nor should that affect your individual choices.

But the problem is when you don't have to deal with it, or even look at it, it stops becoming a political issue. So people vote according to tax rates, or Brexit, and pretend they don't but know that the terrible policies that have targeted the poorest in society don't affect them, whilst congratulating themselves on the amount of money they save the taxpayer and wanting gratitude. Their complacency costs a lot more.

I find the 'I pay for things I don't need so be grateful' attitude is deeply offensive. It's not how society works. Do you feel that way about the Health Service too?

Society works best if everyone has a vested interest in its systems. You can been sold a lie that you can buy your way out of it.

I read your post as supporting the view that the government is the arbiter of appropriate education for all, since they choose what level of education is sufficient for students with an EHCP.

Sorry if that's not what you meant.

@Mrsbabbecho ,

‘Just out of interest, are you in favour of the school you went to being a factor in university and graduate schemes applications as I was under the impression this was now deemed desirable by supporters of the education tax (see thread)’

Yes, but only up to a point.

I am in favour of universities optimising their degree results, which mean selecting by potential, not merely A level grades.

I think we can all agree that an Eton student who gets BBB is either thick or lazy, or a combination of both, and isn’t heading for a starred first! However BBB may be OK from a poor school and underprivileged parents and maybe could do really well at uni.

I don’t want genuinely strong students from private schools excluded, but no reason that a uni shouldn’t consider what support went into getting the grades, particularly the middle ones (A* s in things like Physics do prove real ability, not just good teaching).

I made it explicitly clear my post was about “those having provision made via EHCPs”. I am sorry you extrapolated that to other situations I did not post about.