Education secretary says private schools to blame for closures – not VAT policy
https://news.sky.com/story/education-secretary-says-private-schools-to-blame-for-closures-not-vat-policy-13197261
Posted by topotaul
Education secretary says private schools to blame for closures – not VAT policy
https://news.sky.com/story/education-secretary-says-private-schools-to-blame-for-closures-not-vat-policy-13197261
Posted by topotaul
12 Comments
Like most other countries the UK will be entering into a significant decline in school aged children in the coming years. Schools will be closing regardless of tax or not.
Education is about to enter into terminal decline as an industry.
If a school already has a budget shortfall then a 16.6% hit to income will certainly do it no favours.
Anyone could have predicted this would happen before the election. I dare say it was the point.
I agree with the education secretary. If they are a viable business they’ll both claim VAT back and pay VAT. Like any business earning over that threshold.
Presumably when the financial shit starts to hit the fan, she will use the same argument with regards to the university sector?
Do university tuition fees attract VAT?
Mortgage rates and the cost of living has also massively increased. There will be less people able to afford expensive luxuries like private education
Hmmmm regressive to tax education I think. Presumably this same logic should also be a applied to private hospitals? (Which the government will also be using to cut waiting lists)
Ps someone mentioned the education system failing and when you hear that nearly 50% of students at places like Edinburgh and St Andrews are international it won’t take long to realise something is wrong with the system and there will certainly be a ‘sharp correction’ on the horizon with this sort of model
Highest quality state education has got to be the answer.
It’s absolutely abhorrent that even in 2024, the UK is STILL basically run by the privately schooled elite.
Just one big obnoxious clique, formed to the detriment of everybody else.
Anecdotally I know a couple who are pulling their kids out due to the addition of VAT since they can no longer afford the fees. They aren’t rich, both work for the NHS and are medically trained. Kids are now 15th in queue for their local schools, likely having to go further afield.
Adding 20% VAT will just make private schools more elitist and push the middle class families who could once afford it to send their kids to state schools. This won’t do anything to help state schools and instead increase the burden already on those schools who can’t handle the ridiculous class sizes, lack of funding, revolving door of teachers and so on. This money isn’t going to fix that.
It’s a gimmick to look tough on the rich when the rich won’t even blink and instead the ones who are just trying to do better for their kids will be impacted as will the state schools.
The main issue is we have a collapsing birth rate and it is seriously concerning and not enough people are talking about it. People aren’t avoiding having families by choice but more because they cannot afford to have families. We need to have pronatal politics such as rent controls affordable housing and expansion of housing supply education to be properly funded and free daycare.
I posted this comment a while ago and got downvoted for it, but seems relevant again here:
I watched one of the hustings in my constituency, and the head teacher of a local independent school raised his concerns with the candidates over the VAT policy.
He said their contribution towards the local gdp is around £24 million, and they support 792 local jobs in this area. He said there is a misconception in this country that all independent schools are like Eton or Harrow – his school just about breaks even every year.
Keirs solution is to pass on the costs to the parents. The schools analysis of that indicates they would lose about 20% of students, costing them just over £5 million a year. Or they absorb it themselves, which they don’t have the surplus to do.
He wanted to know how they could make this policy work for the benefit of the pupils and the people they employ in this area.
The Labour candidate started talking about if he was elected he would be in the best position to advocate for the school and discuss possible exemptions to the policy. So there are holes already.
The question the headteacher asked can be viewed here at 1:07:54
https://youtu.be/d5WfllwixmE?si=URF0BNG1nrz6eLm4
I mean, come on. Are these people even real. Slap any person, institution or business with an unexpected cost that they have to pass on to the end customer which makes it unaffordable to them so they leave and butcher said places income. Yeah totally their fault. I’m offended at this comment, it’s beyond stupid.
Just abolish private schools entirely and tax rich people appropriately to pay for education for everyone. If you can afford £10k+ a year for education, then you can pay it in taxes for everyone’s education, I’m afraid.
Idgaf about your “right” to choose. That’s not real, you’ve just made it up.