Whitehall “braced for private schools collapse”

[ICouldBeVioletSky]

Whitehall ‘braced for private schools collapse’ due to fee rises

Worth reading the whole article, it’s not quite as alarmist as the headline suggests. But as you’d expect, gov sources are talking it all down while the ISC is ringing the alarm bell.

https://www.thetimes.com/article/e6465c9e-d462-48cb-a73e-74480059a1f3?shareToken=05bf599cd4a2376fe3ce83cdce607100

I’d be quite surprised if some of the schools near us don't fold tbh. There will definitely be a contraction in the sector, I just hope those that hold on can remain a viable concern.

If they carry on tanking the economy they won't be around too much longer!

10% already have dropped out of our very small Indy. That's 60 pupils roughly. In one very small regional school. 3,000 is a nonsense.

This does not mean they are not qualified teachers. This means they didn’t study that subject at degree level. This is different from not having a PGCE or QTS

In addition to the idea that just 3,000 will drop out 'this year'. Do you mean this academic year:? Because the Labour party said they would bring in VAT next academic year. But they lied. It's coming in next week which is mid-academic year. Alot of parents will grit their teeth and limp to the end of the academic year before leaving. I firmly believe this was a cynical ploy from the LP to skew the figures. It is ever so much more difficult for children to move schools mid-year. So the attrition rate will be fewer than it will prove to be in September 2025. I firmly believe that Starmer wanted to say ; 'See! Hardly any effect, all those moaning private school parents and hardly any moved'.

We have paid next term's fees. And the school made a point that there is a massive backlog of private schools receiving their VAT registration numbers, BUT they were informed they had to charge us VAT anyway. This is actually not permitted under the rules and I know for a fact that the school will have received advice on this. My personal conclusion is that they have been told by HMRC they must charge it, even though it is not permitted under the rules. In other words- the law is being overlooked all in the ideological aim of squeezing money out asap from us.

Society as a whole has a dim view on private education. Any problems the sector may face will gain little public support.

That’s correct. There are 2 separate issues. The vast majority of state schools are not required to employ qualified teachers. Even if they are “qualified”, they may end up teaching a subject they have no experience of.

Naive to assume that teachers from indies will work in the state sector! Most of us have experienced that before moving to indie for the much better working conditions, better pay, free lunches, smaller classes, better facilities etc. They will use their transferable skills to move to other jobs. So there will be a net loss of teachers from the profession and the top indies that remain will be able to attract the best teachers.
Labour don’t care /their kids have never been to inadequate state schools. They have always done a Diane Abbot or Tony Blair.

I disagree. I'm state school educated as are my DC, but you don't speak for me, my social circle or, indeed, 'society as a whole'.

Agreed it would be very difficult to turn state education round in a single term.

It’s completely impossible, however, to turn it round over any period of time if you make no effort whatsoever to do so, as per Rachel, Keir and chums.

They’d rather run an ideological distraction campaign against their class enemies than make any meaningful attempt actually to improve state schools.

And their supporters are falling for it hook line and sinker, as some of the posters on this board have so ably demonstrated.

“Society as a whole has a dim view on private education. Any problems the sector may face will gain little public support.”

Does not apply where I live because our local private schools offer a lot to the state schools and all children on the grounds via sports, swimming, clubs, use of the hall for performances etc etc If the local private schools all went bust, there would literally be no swimming lessons left!

Do schools there get any government funding?

in Australia, typically funding is per student, there are grants that are extra as well of course but the day to day funding is per student, in a state government school this is about $12000ish. In private schools they still get money per student but it is less - again varies depending on the school but say $8000ish.

we have some private schools that don’t cost a huge amount, particularly some regional catholic schools. The fees might only be $4000 a year or less, so affordable for many families. If all the private schools closed or stopped getting government funding the whole system would collapse.

Independent schools in the UK get absolutely no funding from the government (with the exception of a very small number of SEN pupils who have their private school places funded). That fact makes the introduction of VAT on fees even more non sensical.

@Neodymium - no private schools get Government funding for standard children. And now they want to charge a 20 per cent penalty on top of those parents already saving the state 7000-8000 a year in education costs. They want to actually charge the parents anywhere between 3000 a year up to 10000 plus for the privilege of using private education.

'Where you live' is the opposite of society as a whole by definition.

The tax is also entirely NOT means tested. So someone who is on an average salary just about paying for 1 DC to have a private education because they struggled in a large state school with special needs or emotionally (state school classes here are 30 plus up to 34 sometimes in primary schools) and larger in secondaries - that person now has to pay eg 3000 extra a year vs many many far richer people using state schools for free. The whole thing is entirely anomalous and absurd and fundamentally just a political stab at a certain section of society.

'Where you live' is the opposite of society as a whole by definition.

I live in London which is the most populated part of the country and has a population of 9,748,000 and therefore representing a significant percentage of total population and more importantly, the driver of tax take for the whole country.

Not only is the VAT not means tested (so those already struggling to pay fees for a school which serves their child’s needs are hit with a huge tax charge), some of that tax raised is now being used to fund the breakfast of millionaires’ children.

The tax should never have applied to children with SEND or EBSA. Massive one goal by Labour. It’s also essentially blackmail as people don’t like moving happy children nor can schools plan adequately for movers. It should have applied from a September start date for all new joiners into the sector only so people were given notice and a proper choice.

We have paid next term's fees. And the school made a point that there is a massive backlog of private schools receiving their VAT registration numbers, BUT they were informed they had to charge us VAT anyway. This is actually not permitted under the rules and I know for a fact that the school will have received advice on this. My personal conclusion is that they have been told by HMRC they must charge it, even though it is not permitted under the rules.

It is absolutely permitted. The invoice should include the VAT amount but it isn’t listed as VAT. The invoice is reissued once the registration number is received showing the fee for the goods or services plus the amount of VAT that has been charged as a separate figure.

I work in primary and my school, and all the local 'good+' schools are full, most with waiting lists.

The problem with the concept of falling birth rates, etc, as well as closing private schools, is that it's often not quite as evenly spread as some sectors would like to have us believe.

It was definitely listed as VAT. I've just looked at it again. So maybe that was the wrong thing to do. And we got a very long explanatory letter which sounded a bit frustrated, tbh.

They don’t even need qualified teachers!

Either do most state schools, and haven't done for many years, so this is a false argument.
There has been a way around teachers having to be fully qualified for a long time.

The reality locally is that most schools, in both sectors, try to have mainly fully qualified teachers and the schools who have used 'unqualified' teachers tend to use them for specialist subjects where they have alternative qualifications which are often more relevant to the role, such as in PE, music, DT, etc.

Funny they haven’t been braced for schools being underfunded for the last 20 years isn’t it?.

I work in schools admissions. I’ve seen no evidence of any influx from private schools coming.

Perhaps these private schools with a large grounds and over abundant teacher ratios can after all Absorb the cost. Or more likely they’re just greedy and they’ll pass it on to parents.

I was replying to a comment made about all the people who will be unemployed and merely pointing out that there are jobs available for teachers who's private schools are closing.

And a teacher from the private sector leaving the profession is hardly making an impact on the state sector- after all you already left years ago.

If you are unemployed and have the means to not work, until something of your preferance comes up then good on you!

Maybe the private schools could not fund smaller classes and free lunches for teachers and instead pass on those savings to the parents? 🤔😀