The councils need to find spaces for all children!!

[HooverIsAlwaysBroken]

https://bmmagazine.co.uk/news/surrey-runs-out-of-state-school-places-for-private-pupils-as-vat-raid-bites/?amp

I am relieved to see that the Surrey is also looking at options to expand class sizes and use transportation to take children to other areas. They really need to get their act together quickly.

all children has a right to state education.

Why did they bother then

@strawberrybubblegum totally completely stupid

Indeed.

I find this VAT policy rather like saying: oh I have a broken leg. In order for things to be fair, my neighbour must have his leg deliberately broken. We will both have a broken leg and all will be the same.

To get votes

@suburburban they bothered because it was the only policy they had when going for election even when they were told it wd raise no money and actually cost the government Teeves Phillipson and Rayner all vindictive chippy bitches

I don’t understand your comment.

VAT isn't a luxury tax. For some kids it is essential

This thread is not about parents paying or not paying.

It’s actually about councils (specifically Surrey) having run out of state places. This will be an ongoing problem and therefore it will need to be talked about.

However that doesn't negate the fact that private schools are a luxury and should be taxed as such

By that measure any additional education is therefore a luxury. Tutoring, sports lessons, music lessons, dancing, drama. Would you happy for these to attract VAT?

This is appalling but don’t you think the answer should be to level up not level down?

Because as others have noted, even on Labour’s own analysis the expected amount raised by this policy is going to make zero difference whether to the RAC/portacabin situation or to state schools in any other way. But some state pupils at least are likely to suffer from increased class sizes and/or from an influx of SEN children meaning SEN provision is even more thinly spread.

Do you not think Labour should be implementing tax policies which will raise enough to make meaningful improvements to state schools, and to narrow the gap with the independent sector that way?

Would you prefer your child to be educated in properly resourced fit for purpose buildings or do you think instead we should force all private school children to be schooled in portacabins with no resources because hey, that would be fair on everyone, right?

This policy is nothing more than a pathetic distraction tactic by Labour - no better than the Tories with their Rwanda ‘solution’ to illegal immigration - and it’s depressing how many people cannot see this.

@ICouldBeVioletSky totally and utterly depressing 😩

If the PS kids have to go into the state sector isn't that making the schools more overcrowded and resources having to go further.

Ill thought out policy

I'll

“Maybe if more of the people with money had a stake in improving the state education system improvements would be made.”

@TheyCantBurnUsAll but this hasn’t worked at all in healthcare with accident and emergency provision. For genuine emergencies and many accidents there is no private alternative, the filthy rich and the more normally better off (solicitors, dentists etc) and indeed the influential (MPs, civil servants scions of business etc) have no alternative but to use NHS provision.

But clearly this has not led to high quality emergency medicine provision, courtesy of engagement and lobbying by said rich/influential people.

None of that would particularly bother me, no. And yes I do pay for most of those for DS (two instruments, multiple sports clubs).

Short term issue. Worth it for wider equality in the longer term.

Likelihood is that there ARE spaces, just not in the immediate area or the desirable schools.

@MiseryIn the policy isn’t addressing equality, it’s making sure the middle class is priced out of private school, only for the extremely wealthy. It will push the disadvantaged out of good catchments and grammar school as those previously in private will buy into them all while schools are having to increase class sizes, further damaging state education. It’s a very short sighted policy.

And do you think, that in the 1960s, when Labour scraped the 2 tier system of grammar/secondary modern that inequality was decreased? No, what it led to was the rise of private schools and increased inequality. You know, like the grammar school Starmer himself went to. It turned itself into a private school, whilst Starmer was still at it. So he has had the privilege of grammar and private for himself.

It is far beyond hypocrisy.

There are plenty of people with money who absolutely won’t accept a rubbish state education for their kids. They’ll move to the catchment of a great state school, pushing others out - or they’ll just bugger off abroad. Decreasing overall taxation revenue.

Not to mention that anyone who wants to learn can simply switch on YouTube. For board specific excellent GCSE content. Free.

That's a good thought experiment: how would you feel @MrsSchrute if the government very suddenly (6 months notice) introduced an additional 20% tax on all mortgage payments, in order to fund improved state social housing?

Mortgage is a similar proportion of people's income as fees (so 20% of it is significant but usually not impossible... by giving something else up). It's similarly targetted at a luxury which only privileged people have. It's similarly hypothecated to fund something which most people are in favour of: but which costs the state a lot and so is underfunded and has limited availability. This new Mortgage tax is really very similar to the new Education tax.

How much is your new tax? Could you find an extra 20% on top of your mortgage? What would you have to give up? How do you feel about it?

But now -to make it more similar to Labour's education tax - imagine that whilst you 100% pay your mortgage payments, the government 100% pays for social housing for anyone who doesn't have a house. So as people decide to give up their house and mortgage - either they can't afford the extra 20% or it no longer seems worthwhile - the government has to start paying for their housing. Inevitably, existing social housing is under strain. The government must either squeeze more peoole into the existing flats or use the money they had earmarked for improvements to build more housing. So despite the 20% tax, social housing no better.

Oh and some people who had adapted their own house for disability (at their own cost) but couldn't afford the extra 20% are now housed in unsuitable housing with stairs. After it has been utterly shit for them for about 2 years and their mental health is shot, the government will pay for an incredibly expensive jetpack for them. The person would have preferred to stay in their own, adapted home all along.

You're paying 20% of your mortgage extra tax, but no one in social housing is better off. Some people are much worse off. It's a complete shit-show.

Still happy with it?

Except it won't create wider equality

Labour began the process, true, the Tories continued it.

re your earlier post, Sunak froze tax thresholds NOT labour, where would you get the money to unfreeze them earlier than Reeves has said?

Where and who would you tax to get the approx £6 billion VAT on fees will raise for the state sector?

Its all very well calling for this or that tax not to implemented but what taxes would you raise or what services would you cut? or would you just borrow?

Would I be happy to pay extra for my house, or not pay and have a house for free?
Yep, reckon I'd be ok with that!

Well you don't give a rats about their children - so why should they care about yours? Why should the care and concern (and their earned money) flow in only one direction: towards you and your children?

1p on the 40% rate of tax. Fair and raises money transparently. And how about those like Starmer in 2million pound houses helping out the state schools that their kids use for free, with a contribution?

VAT on private won’t raise 6bn. That’s fiction. I thought the figure touted by Labour was 1bn. But it won’t even raise that. Millions going to be paid back to schools like Eton, who will be receiving £5m in reclaimed VAT. Millions of pounds worth of upfront fee payments are being held by private schools. If paid before Labour got in, then no VAT can be charged to those parents for schooling in 2025 and onwards. Thousands of children exiting private schools - will continue at exit points. A explosion of SEN kids coming out of private. More pressure on the state sector.

like I say, I thank God that my own SEN kid has left and is adult.

@MiseryIn

Worth it for wider equality in the longer term.

Parents who can easily afford private school will stick with that.

Some who can only just afford it will switch to state, or won't start private. But most can hang on until a natural changing point.

The spaces in the good schools will continue to go to people who can afford the catchments.

The spaces in the less desirable schools (as you put it) will continue to go to those people who can't afford the catchments.

In a couple of years - when the number of 11 year olds falls - catchments for the better schools would have got wider. And the younger cohort of less wealthy kids could have gone to the better schools.

But since Labour has increased the number of rich kids going to the good state schools, they will still have to go to the less desirable schools.

How exactly does this improve equality?