Whitehall “braced for private schools collapse” 4

[ICouldBeVioletSky]

Continuing the discussion about the impact of VAT on independent schools…

Governments are woefully inept at predicting things like this. Remember when Labour said 14,000 people would move from Poland to the U.K. in 1994, when we lifted immigration laws early before the rest of Europe.

1 million people arrived that year.

They haven’t got a fucking clue but in the end this was a sop to the ideologues who’ve been baying for PS closures for years.

It’s typical Labour sadly, cooking the golden egg laying goose.

Rachel Reeves really should resign for so many reasons.

When is the judicial review happening of this new policy?

Nope, it’s firmly a labour policy that can only have been born of the sickening Labour world view. No amount of whataboutary will change this. Far right? 🙄Yep I’m surprised the education tax wasn’t wrapped up as a far right tax . Luckily Labour will be back under their rock in just over 4 years, this time hopefully for good.

So where’s the money for 6,500 teachers and breakfast clubs coming from?

How will DfE deliver “high and rising standards” by ending “tax breaks” for private schools with a policy that generates £0 revenue?

The information submitted to the OBR states 34,000 VAT-paying students leave by 28/29.

Yet their own internal modelling predicts 54,000 in the first two years - 10% of their VAT-paying market.

The IFS report that the government have been using cherry picked figures from to support their position, shows that at a 10% transfer rate, the policy becomes cost neutral. So NO revenue.

The budget is based on lies!

It’s the lies, the doubling down about the reality of the state sector AND the private sector that the government are doing that gets me. It’s awful.

I voted Labour because I wanted to protect and improve public services after the shit show of the Tories, and to reverse the escalation in child poverty. I remembered Tony Blair focusing on education and multi-term planning for the country and the stability for schools. I remembered the focus on familiars and assumed that there would be a new big vision for education and funding with Labour. This manifesto promise like all manifesto promises did not mean automatic translation to reality.
I now don’t recognise Labour- targeting disabled and ill people, this absolute wrecking and denying around private education while not investing in state school pupils . Costing the majority of state school pupils will be the outcome. It’s incredibly disillusioning and sad.
Kier is performing brilliantly on the world stage which is great in these unstable times so that’s good, but some of the cabinet around him are not high calibre politicians and are letting us down domestically. He will get punished very hard at the local elections and I am very worried Reform will do really well.

*focus on families, not familiars.
Though I’d be pretty happy to have a cat with magical powers

I thought some may be interested in new data on expected pupil numbers across different regions. The differences are stark with rapidly declining numbers in some areas and growth in even primary school place requirements in the East Midlands.
“there’s a declining birth rate so the state system can cope with any movement” really doesn’t speak true for all parts of the country.

I’m East Mids. 21% of my daughters yr 6 class, including her, are leaving for state education in Sept. This is one of the areas most under pressure for senior school places.

www.tes.com/magazine/analysis/general/pupil-numbers-regional-forecasts-schools-need-to-know?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR4DDE9uiQKAbVWFy81VKwxeD5tYuWezg0R61vRp4KPd1q2Is9s4UKn0sKAyDw_aem_q8xLXvnoHGxwbGFOC-MSMA

Paywall bypass link: https://archive.ph/8oTfl

Had Labour decided to phase in VAT on fees for new starters in YR, Y7 etc, I would still have disagreed with the principle, but might have understood some kind of circular argument that made the case for encouraging parents to opt for state in the face of falling numbers at primary, thus keeping primary schools open and teachers employed.

The cack handed method they have used is just unforgivable.

Unfortunately the economic ineptitude means that people aren't going to be rushing to have another kid right now, and birthrates will continue to decline.

We have an only, as do the majority of our peers. Not the case when I was growing up when it was quite unusual among my school friends and my parents' peergroup.

The question of "is London becoming the preserve of the wealthy" was answered about 15 years ago when the gov began buying up housing stock by outbidding LA's and shipping off whole communities in Tower Hamlets and other poorest areas without any medical records, meaning councils up and down the country now have no affordable accommodation to home their own. Gentrification. Starmer and his mates are the ones who've benefited most with soaring house prices and land grabs, so of course they won't agree they've won out by having the best state schools in the country because they've actively supported this happening whilst living in the capital, screwing over the rest of the country.

@CurlewKate you sarcastically responded to the above by saying “it must be lovely to know with such certainty what other people are thinking”, suggesting that @Airwaterfire was falsely attributing malicious motives to some who support VAT.

Here is a post this morning from another thread:

”Plenty of kids have a hard time at school. Most of them have to get on with it. But yours are of course especially special and mummy has to pay for a special education to cater to their specialness. And of course, for this mummy deserves special tax breaks. Got it.”

This was responding to a parent with SEND children, and the poster had already had a post deleted for telling the same parent that her kids would come to harm due to her poor parenting of them, for not forcing them into a mainstream state school.

@ICouldBeVioletSkyThere is, as I’m sure you know, a big difference between an individual shitty comment, and attributing a shitty motive to an entire group of posters.

@Airwaterfire’s comment clearly referred to the shitty motive displayed by the group of posters whose posts made very clear they had a shitty motive. There have been plenty on these threads although mainly in the early days, and most seem to have piped down now they’ve realised Labour took them for absolute fools and they’ve not actually got anything to crow about for some reason.

It’s a bit odd for you to try to attribute a different motive to @Airwaterfire when she posted what she did, but as you say it must be lovely to know with such certainty what other people are thinking…. 🤨

@ICouldBeVioletSkyseveral people on this thread have said that posters (like me) who support the levying of VAT can only be motivated by envy, spite or stupidity. I agree that the poster you quote said something shitty. But I can assure you, it’s not a lot of fun being repeatedly called envious, spiteful and stupid.

‘**several people on this thread have said that posters (like me) who support the levying of VAT can only be motivated by envy, spite or stupidity’

Respectfully, what other motivation can there be for education tax? I’m genuinely interested

It’s not a lot of fun being repeatedly called envious, spiteful and stupid.

No, I’m sure it isn’t. But many of us on these threads have received personal attacks about ourselves and our own children. I had a poster tying themselves up in knots to try to prove that I was lying about why my children were/are in private school. I was told that state schools can meet the needs of every child, and then in the next breath was informed that the world doesn’t revolve around children like my disabled son whose needs were not met in state. Other posters have had their children described as mediocre, thick, pampered, spoon-fed, had their grades bought for them, unable to cope at university and goodness knows what else. Those of us with disabled children have been accused of inventing their disabilities. That’s not a lot of fun either to be honest.

Respectfully, what other motivation can there be for education tax? I’m genuinely interested

I doubt that you are ‘genuinely interested’, given your previous comments about ‘bigoted easily led less than average intelligence people’.

@FairMindedMaidenIf you were genuinely interested, you would have read people’s posts. To be honest, I have had enough of being called envious, spiteful and stupid. And adding “respectfully” isn’t a get out of jail card!

@CatkinToadflaxThen respond to, and report the people who make shitty personal comments. I’ll join you. But why support the sweeping generalizations being made about people who have a different view than you about VAT? And I hate to say this, but there are plenty of shitty comments about state schools, children and parents too. None of us should be excusing shitty comments from either side.

I’ve read 100s of posts and have yet to read any other motivation. There isn’t any.

I agree with you on that.

Other posters have had their children described as mediocre, thick, pampered, spoon-fed, had their grades bought for them, unable to cope at university and goodness knows what else.

@CurlewKate, this, as Catkintoadflax points out, is true, yet you denied it was the case, so maybe you are only seeing one side of the insults.

Some posters have been so quick to declare anyone that’s not vocally anti VAT as motivated by ‘stupidity, envy, spitefulness and jealousy’ that they haven’t stopped to consider any other views.

What are the other views?

Improved socio economic cohesion in state schools is a pretty obvious one.

Simplification of the tax system in general
is another one - which is one of the reasons why New Zealand levies GST on private education.

‘Improved socio economic cohesion in state schools is a pretty obvious one.’

This would imply a significant shift of children from the independent sector to state. Labour claim this would be minimal (much less than the 10% required to shift into a net loss) in fact they claim the opposite as otherwise the education tax becomes a cost as apparently all independent parents can afford the education tax. Which is it? Children are going to forced out of schools and schools closed resulting in tax loss or they won’t and this will generate revenue? How many schools closing or children being forced out their schools is acceptable and for what level of ‘social economic cohesion’? What level of the 4 billion a year independent schools save the tax payer is an acceptable loss and for what level of ‘social economic cohesion’?

‘Simplification of the tax system in general
is another one - which is one of the reasons why New Zealand levies GST on private education.’
Simplification of the tax system? What could be simpler than education is tax exempt? New Zealand’s tax is anything but simple as they don’t tax the donations, would you like a list of all the countries that don’t tax education? Would you like a list of all the countries that offer tax benefits to take the education cost away from the state burden?
Again how many children forced out of their schools, schools closed or net reduction in the education budget is acceptable to simplify taxes?

This would imply a significant shift of children from the independent sector to state. Labour claim this would be minimal (much less than the 10% required to shift into a net loss) in fact they claim the opposite as otherwise the education tax becomes a cost as apparently all independent parents can afford the education tax. Which is it?

It's Schrödinger's VAT