I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
They also provide a lot of subsidised places, and a lot of facilities for partner schools and the local community.
If Starmer's proposals eventually emerge from the other end of legal action, the first will have been curtailed and the latter may well have gone.
AFAICS the intellectual underpinnings of the policy have not considered the value of either, and the cost that will be required to repair the damage, seriously.
A more sensible policy would be something like means tested tax relief on Independent School Fees for parents of more modest means, and seeking greater integration of the sectors.
But that would be prioritising education quality over ideology, which won't do on this issue.
As I have said before, I think Public Schools should retain their charitable status, but be required to do more for it, like taking kids off the care conveyor belt and welcoming them to Mallory Towers.
And kids who've been permanently excluded from mainstream schools for behavioural problems. If these schools are as great as we are told, and with their ample resources, they should be able to easily reintegrate these pupils into schooling.
Nice one for the consequentialism/deontology debate there: should nasty, disruptive little thugs be given a free education at the top public schools - something almost everyone else could only dream of - if it's for the greater societal good.
I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Except these are not our last remaining reserves. We have other remaining reserves untapped even after this.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Except these are not our last remaining reserves. We have other remaining reserves untapped even after this.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
The UK helps to prop up the Saudi dictatorship with military technology and assistance. If they are doing that then they might as well buy oil off them.
As crap as he is, Sunak is the best they have (who has any chance of being leader). A challenge would be from a headbanger candidate like Braverman; the Tories would be sunk for a generation.
Might there be a desire to find a true "safe pair of hands" candidate to take them to the next election? Sunak was meant to have been that, but he now seems too prone to panic.
Brown eventually learned to play that role (with Mandelson's help), and saved Labour from outright disaster in 2010. And even amidst the carnage of 1997, the Tory faces that I remember - Major, Clarke, Mawhinney - held it together enough to do much better than the polls had been suggesting.
But Sunak's too wobbly. Dither, dither, dither, handbrake turn, denial, dither, confirmation, crash, retreat, flames, screaming. Over and over again. No matter how popular any one move happens to be with the base, he'll chuck the benefit away by lurching in a different direction soon afterwards. How can he possibly get through a campaign?
Someone with no long-term leadership ambitions might fit the bill. Hunt? It's a pity that Wallace and Sharma are retiring. My god, even Shapps would do a better job of just picking a line and sticking to it.
I don't think they will, but I do think they probably should.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
Shouldn't charities be run for the public benefit? Maybe private schools benefit the children who go to them (debatable) in that they try to give an even bigger head start to children who are mostly already privileged. And there are quite large costs to society in general, so I'm not convinced they offer any public benefit on balance, so I don't think they should generally qualify as charities, though might in some cases.
Charities must be run for public benefit, not private profit.
That means for the benefit of a section of a public. Almost no charity is run to benefit the public in general.
A bridge club in Hitchin can be a charity.
They also have to avoid doing harm to others. A bridge club in Hitchin is unlikely to be hurting anyone very much. But a school whose main function is to give the children attending a headstart over most children (and that is what the parents are paying many thousands for) is by definition harming the prospects of children who don't get the headstart.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Except these are not our last remaining reserves. We have other remaining reserves untapped even after this.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
Our remaining reserves are insignificant compared with those possessed by Russia and Saudi Arabia. Squandering our reserves now will only hand more power to those countries with large reserves in the future. If you want to know who the Putinist idiots are, look in the direction of those who have done their best to keep us reliant on the sale and consumption of fossil fuels.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
You're absolutely kidding yourself if you think anyone wealthy enough to pay for private school fees is going to end up at a sink school instead. The money they're spending on fees could easily go on rent or mortgage for a good schools catchment area instead.
As I have said before, I think Public Schools should retain their charitable status, but be required to do more for it, like taking kids off the care conveyor belt and welcoming them to Mallory Towers.
There are stories of that happening, but agree there should be more of them.
Somehow we need a one-nation approach to state and private sector. We need to blur the boundary between the two. Now that may sounds rather Blairite but given where we are and the huge amount of resources in the private sector vs other countries, as well as the export business with the kids of international elites, some sort of fudge may be the only option.
Imagine a world where as a parent you have options all the way from contributing a bit to a largely state education (say by using a private school for some sports or clubs and societies), to attending a private school for free with government funding, to paying a small amount of fees per term for a school supported by direct government grants, all the way through to paying through the nose for Eton. Some will see that as a dystopia but it's pretty similar to how the university sector works, and it's not a million miles from how health or public transport work either.
Education vouchers, a long-standing policy of the free-market think tanks. Let the parents choose the schools, not the other way around. Let the good schools expand, and the bad ones fail.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
How do you objectively define main function in life?
And how does that objective definition not apply to the main function of charity shops being retail rather than charity?
As I have said before, I think Public Schools should retain their charitable status, but be required to do more for it, like taking kids off the care conveyor belt and welcoming them to Mallory Towers.
And kids who've been permanently excluded from mainstream schools for behavioural problems. If these schools are as great as we are told, and with their ample resources, they should be able to easily reintegrate these pupils into schooling.
I’ve actually witnessed them doing that.
Kid excluded from school ended up at Eton on a scholarship as a result of his rowing.
Now at Yale, IIRC
My old school did the same, as well; at least under the headmaster we had when we started.
The school my youngest goes to is now at 20% of intake on 100% bursaries. Heading to 25%. They are doing an American style foundation - fund raising on a massive scale from former pupils.
The headmaster has just moved to run the umbrella group of schools. He is going to continue the same plan there.
When I asked “why stop at 25%?”, he said that was just the first stage…
The reasoning is interesting - rather than just end up with a narrower and narrower entry set, it’s about building a broader social structure. For the benefit of the richer kids as much as the bursary kids.
I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Except these are not our last remaining reserves. We have other remaining reserves untapped even after this.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
Our remaining reserves are insignificant compared with those possessed by Russia and Saudi Arabia. Squandering our reserves now will only hand more power to those countries with large reserves in the future. If you want to know who the Putinist idiots are, look in the direction of those who have done their best to keep us reliant on the sale and consumption of fossil fuels.
Compared to Russia or Saudi Arabia is utterly irrelevant. The question is what our remaining reserves our compared to what we could need in the future and the truth is we have a healthy reserve it's not being squandered.
I absolutely support phasing down the consumption of fossil fuels, and said so myself. Production is unrelated to that.
As crap as he is, Sunak is the best they have (who has any chance of being leader). A challenge would be from a headbanger candidate like Braverman; the Tories would be sunk for a generation.
Might there be a desire to find a true "safe pair of hands" candidate to take them to the next election? Sunak was meant to have been that, but he now seems too prone to panic.
Brown eventually learned to play that role (with Mandelson's help), and saved Labour from outright disaster in 2010. And even amidst the carnage of 1997, the Tory faces that I remember - Major, Clarke, Mawhinney - held it together enough to do much better than the polls had been suggesting.
But Sunak's too wobbly. Dither, dither, dither, handbrake turn, denial, dither, confirmation, crash, retreat, flames, screaming. Over and over again. No matter how popular any one move happens to be with the base, he'll chuck the benefit away by lurching in a different direction soon afterwards. How can he possibly get through a campaign?
Someone with no long-term leadership ambitions might fit the bill. Hunt? It's a pity that Wallace and Sharma are retiring. My god, even Shapps would do a better job of just picking a line and sticking to it.
I don't think they will, but I do think they probably should.
Grant Shapps PM would, if nothing else, show a twisted sense of humour on the party of the Tories.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Certainly not excusing it – that was a vile rant. But Fox clearly has mental health issues. He is not the first person to be sent – literally – mad by life in the commentariat goldfish bowl, and won't be the last.
As I have said before, I think Public Schools should retain their charitable status, but be required to do more for it, like taking kids off the care conveyor belt and welcoming them to Mallory Towers.
Whilst I broadly agree my concern with the idea of removing kids from the care conveyor belt is what happens to those kids who spend term time boarding with Princes and sons of oligarchs is what do they do during the holidays.
They can’t stay at school so where do they go as I would imagine it would be very hard to find care places just for the holidays, or foster parents who would just take these kids in batches of weeks during the holidays and the extremity of the dual existence without the stable family input during holidays to balance the boarding school life. It might end up doing more psychological damage to them in the long run.
It's not hard to find people who foster temporarily, it's called respite care. I agree they'd need somewhere to go in the holidays.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
..and it hasn't been since 1868 at the latest. People who talk as if they're providing some great benefit to the wider population are being deeply disingenuous.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
They also provide a lot of subsidised places, and a lot of facilities for partner schools and the local community.
If Starmer's proposals eventually emerge from the other end of legal action, the first will have been curtailed and the latter may well have gone.
AFAICS the intellectual underpinnings of the policy have not considered the value of either, and the cost that will be required to repair the damage, seriously.
A more sensible policy would be something like means tested tax relief on Independent School Fees for parents of more modest means, and seeking greater integration of the sectors.
But that would be prioritising education quality over ideology, which won't do on this issue.
Whether the policy is sensible or not depends on whether you wish to encourage or discourage the use of private schools.
So I think this is clear blue water, isn't it? Delay the green measures and green light fossil fuel extraction.
In that moment of reflection in the voting booth I expect that this will sway a large number of voters towards the Cons. Notwithstanding the broad and deep visceral dislike of the party which will perhaps or otherwise stay their hand.
Maybe. Not sure. Don't you think the general public always thought it obvious, whoever is in power, that these deadlines would be extended?
Well yes. But what is Lab's stated position on it.
Neil Henderson @hendopolis · 15m MAIL: Labour’s class war begins on Day One #TomorrowsPapersToday
===
"Backlash as parents face school fees hike"
How many Mail readers send their kids to private school???
It is not just the mail going onto the attack
The i as well
Sorry the link didn't work
The Mail tries its best to make it sound like Labour will be charging a new fee for all parents . Not sure the I headline will worry Labour . A backlash from private schools . 93% of children do not go to private schools . They get a subsidy in effect from tax payers whilst state schools are crumbling. Do you want your taxes subsiding rich parennts sending their kids to places like Eton .
That will be the Labour campaign.
Of course, the exact opposite is true.
Every parent who sends their child to private school is effectively paying double - they are paying all the tax for a state school place, but not taking it up, thereby donating the resources they would have used so they are available for everyone else instead. Meanwhile, they expand the level of investment going into the education sector overall, funding the training of more teachers, experimenting with new education styles, more resources and facilities, rather than spend it on property and consumption. Which is where they money would otherwise go. And private schools are charitable endeavours that don't generate profit or return to investors but invest in an educational mission overall.
This is why governments of all stripes have recognised this in the tax system for decades - because it's in the public interest. They are a net good.
It won't be Eton, Harrow or Winchester hit by these changes. It will be the smaller more marginal private schools where two parents working full-time - doctors, accountants, pilots, solicitors, and small businessmen - work hard to be able to afford the fees are forced to pull their kids out, with the school closing and the community assets lost. The state system won't gain a bean from it except an additional burden and the education sector overall will shrink. We'll all be poorer for it.
It's a disgrace of a policy based on prejudice. It deserves to fail, as all bad policies should.
This is spot on. (Even if Casino thinks I’m a “Leftie”.)
The big name public schools will sail on regardless. The ones that will be hit will be the small ones with the specialisms in autism support or music or whatever, where the parents have scrimped and saved to send their kids because they’ve been failed by the state system.
If your position is “well improve the state system so it caters for those kids” that’s an honest position to take… and also I have a bridge to sell you. You have a look at the EHCP backlog for any given local authority and tell me how long that’s going to take.
Really it’s not that fricking hard (and here is where Casino will conclude I am in fact a Leftie). Tax wealth, rather than taxing people when they choose to spend that wealth on good things like education. A couple of pence on income tax for the super-rich would dwarf anything raised by VAT on school fees.
But Starmer won’t do that. It’s tokenism rather than genuine redistribution, at the expense of kids’ education.
What a load of shite. This is closing a tax loophole on a tax that is levied on pretty much everything else.
If VAT on private school fees already existed nobody would be campaigning to remove it.
There are huge swathes of the UK economy which are exempt from VAT.
Start with £250bn sales of food. - that's retail consumer sales, What about purchases of food by businesses - no idea on that. Add in segments of the clothing market - children incl. school uniforms. Then all businesses turning over less than £85k a year (approx figure). Reduced VAT on energy bills at 5%. (Energy bills = £50bn to £100bn a year at present) Medicines and medical devices, including I think Motability cars (Motability do £4bn of business a year). Then there's a whole bundle of non-VAT or reduced rate VAT exemptions for charities. Financial services.
And it goes on...
No precise idea on the total, but it looks to me as if perhaps 15-20% of GDP is VAT exempt.
I think this is the important point that both sides are perhaps avoiding. Whether VAT is charged on an activity is often arbitrary and not consistent with similar products or services.
So whether private school fees should be chargeable cannot be resolved by considering whether they are a "genuine" charity or not, or if they are good or bad for society. It is rather a political and fiscal choice without a correct answer either way, and it is a matter of preference rather than charging VAT is right or wrong.
Politically I think it is an own goal by Labour, although probably most helpful to the LDems rather than the Cons. Fiscally I think it is the correct decision.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Also, can someone tell me how much of a charity's income needs to go towards charitable efforts; how much income they can spend on salaries and overheads, and who checks this?
And can that please be expanded to all charities. Many of the larger charities, those that advertise on TV (although mostly at reduced rates), have massive overheads, large offices, and plenty of executives on six-figure salaries.
But they don't generally allocate their services of the basis of recipients' ability to pay for those services, but rather on need.
If I was to set up an education charity, providing schools, I'd be looking to target it at the areas where all the local schools are shit and no one can afford to pay. Not to the parents (like myself) who live in areas where all the local state schools are actually very good and going private, at a bottom end private school, would potentially be a viable option finance-wise.
That's funny, I was just in an Age Concern shop over the weekend where we picked up some second hand books for my kids - and they weren't doling them out, they were very much allocating who could leave with the stock based upon the recipients ability to pay for those services.
Most large charities fundraise in no small part based on ability to pay.
The ones paying (myself buying a book, parents of pupils who are paying) aren't the ones receiving the charity, the ones who are receiving the charity is others.
Do the teachers donate their services, enabling the charities to sell them VAT free? (flippant, of course)
(I learned some things from that link, hadn't realised that charities collect VAT on sales where they substantially alter donated items or, indeed, use raw materials that are bought in - but in the latter case they can claim the VAT on supplies so it's neutral except for the value added.)
I know you're being flippant but I'm pretty certain the staff at charity shops are paid.
[They had an advert on the door saying staff wanted and what the pay rates are, which is a bit of a clue]
Some are, some aren't. Usually a core of paid staff to do the more technical/tricky stuff and to manage a more or less shifting population of volunteers. Standard practice in that sector, e.g. for museums or nature reserves.
As I have said before, I think Public Schools should retain their charitable status, but be required to do more for it, like taking kids off the care conveyor belt and welcoming them to Mallory Towers.
And kids who've been permanently excluded from mainstream schools for behavioural problems. If these schools are as great as we are told, and with their ample resources, they should be able to easily reintegrate these pupils into schooling.
I’ve actually witnessed them doing that.
Kid excluded from school ended up at Eton on a scholarship as a result of his rowing.
Now at Yale, IIRC
My old school did the same, as well; at least under the headmaster we had when we started.
The school my youngest goes to is now at 20% of intake on 100% bursaries. Heading to 25%. They are doing an American style foundation - fund raising on a massive scale from former pupils.
The headmaster has just moved to run the umbrella group of schools. He is going to continue the same plan there.
When I asked “why stop at 25%?”, he said that was just the first stage…
The reasoning is interesting - rather than just end up with a narrower and narrower entry set, it’s about building a broader social structure. For the benefit of the richer kids as much as the bursary kids.
I support doing this nationally, for all schools, except that I'd go to 100% bursaries and fund-raise from alumni who have done well (and from others who have subsequently entered the country and may wish to send their children to such schools or employ alumni of such schools etc). We could call the fund raising contributions income tax
I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Except these are not our last remaining reserves. We have other remaining reserves untapped even after this.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
The UK helps to prop up the Saudi dictatorship with military technology and assistance. If they are doing that then they might as well buy oil off them.
You're really not that stupid. I have no problem with us giving stuff to them. It's us being reliant on them that is the problem.
As I have said before, I think Public Schools should retain their charitable status, but be required to do more for it, like taking kids off the care conveyor belt and welcoming them to Mallory Towers.
And kids who've been permanently excluded from mainstream schools for behavioural problems. If these schools are as great as we are told, and with their ample resources, they should be able to easily reintegrate these pupils into schooling.
I’ve actually witnessed them doing that.
Kid excluded from school ended up at Eton on a scholarship as a result of his rowing.
Now at Yale, IIRC
My old school did the same, as well; at least under the headmaster we had when we started.
The school my youngest goes to is now at 20% of intake on 100% bursaries. Heading to 25%. They are doing an American style foundation - fund raising on a massive scale from former pupils.
The headmaster has just moved to run the umbrella group of schools. He is going to continue the same plan there.
When I asked “why stop at 25%?”, he said that was just the first stage…
The reasoning is interesting - rather than just end up with a narrower and narrower entry set, it’s about building a broader social structure. For the benefit of the richer kids as much as the bursary kids.
I support doing this nationally, for all schools, except that I'd go to 100% bursaries and fund-raise from alumni who have done well (and from others who have subsequently entered the country and may wish to send their children to such schools or employ alumni of such schools etc). We could call the fund raising contributions income tax
And even national insurance. And inheritance tax. Which would be even more appropriate, given the names.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Also, can someone tell me how much of a charity's income needs to go towards charitable efforts; how much income they can spend on salaries and overheads, and who checks this?
And can that please be expanded to all charities. Many of the larger charities, those that advertise on TV (although mostly at reduced rates), have massive overheads, large offices, and plenty of executives on six-figure salaries.
But they don't generally allocate their services of the basis of recipients' ability to pay for those services, but rather on need.
If I was to set up an education charity, providing schools, I'd be looking to target it at the areas where all the local schools are shit and no one can afford to pay. Not to the parents (like myself) who live in areas where all the local state schools are actually very good and going private, at a bottom end private school, would potentially be a viable option finance-wise.
That's funny, I was just in an Age Concern shop over the weekend where we picked up some second hand books for my kids - and they weren't doling them out, they were very much allocating who could leave with the stock based upon the recipients ability to pay for those services.
Most large charities fundraise in no small part based on ability to pay.
The ones paying (myself buying a book, parents of pupils who are paying) aren't the ones receiving the charity, the ones who are receiving the charity is others.
Do the teachers donate their services, enabling the charities to sell them VAT free? (flippant, of course)
(I learned some things from that link, hadn't realised that charities collect VAT on sales where they substantially alter donated items or, indeed, use raw materials that are bought in - but in the latter case they can claim the VAT on supplies so it's neutral except for the value added.)
I know you're being flippant but I'm pretty certain the staff at charity shops are paid.
[They had an advert on the door saying staff wanted and what the pay rates are, which is a bit of a clue]
Some are, some aren't. Usually a core of paid staff to do the more technical/tricky stuff and to manage a more or less shifting population of volunteers. Standard practice in that sector, e.g. for museums or nature reserves.
Some charity shop managers are given a target for using volunteers to cut costs. Some shops send home zero hours employees if enough volunteers show up. On the day.
Yes, that’s right. Show up for for work and get told that enough people are doing your job for free….
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
"93% of parents don't pay."
Income tax, all the other taxes, VAT, council tax ...
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
As I have said before, I think Public Schools should retain their charitable status, but be required to do more for it, like taking kids off the care conveyor belt and welcoming them to Mallory Towers.
And kids who've been permanently excluded from mainstream schools for behavioural problems. If these schools are as great as we are told, and with their ample resources, they should be able to easily reintegrate these pupils into schooling.
Nice one for the consequentialism/deontology debate there: should nasty, disruptive little thugs be given a free education at the top public schools - something almost everyone else could only dream of - if it's for the greater societal good.
The top public schools already churn out plenty of nasty thugs!
I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Except these are not our last remaining reserves. We have other remaining reserves untapped even after this.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
Our remaining reserves are insignificant compared with those possessed by Russia and Saudi Arabia. Squandering our reserves now will only hand more power to those countries with large reserves in the future. If you want to know who the Putinist idiots are, look in the direction of those who have done their best to keep us reliant on the sale and consumption of fossil fuels.
Compared to Russia or Saudi Arabia is utterly irrelevant. The question is what our remaining reserves our compared to what we could need in the future and the truth is we have a healthy reserve it's not being squandered.
I absolutely support phasing down the consumption of fossil fuels, and said so myself. Production is unrelated to that.
What percentage of oil production is used for fuel as opposed to medicines, plastics and the rest?
Would some people be against it even if none of the oil ended up being burned?
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Children get bullied in private schools too! If a parent decides that moving their child is the right thing to do, that absolutely should be a choice that's available. Better still would be to try to address the bullying behaviour, but that's sometimes difficult.
But none of this justifies creating an eloi/morlock caste system. Choice should be available to all, not just people with £££.
Choice is available to all.
I'm currently looking at various options of secondary schools for my eldest as she's in Year 5 so we will need to make our choices next year. All state sector. Again I'm prioritising quality over convenience/distance.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
Shouldn't charities be run for the public benefit? Maybe private schools benefit the children who go to them (debatable) in that they try to give an even bigger head start to children who are mostly already privileged. And there are quite large costs to society in general, so I'm not convinced they offer any public benefit on balance, so I don't think they should generally qualify as charities, though might in some cases.
Charities must be run for public benefit, not private profit.
That means for the benefit of a section of a public. Almost no charity is run to benefit the public in general.
A bridge club in Hitchin can be a charity.
They also have to avoid doing harm to others. A bridge club in Hitchin is unlikely to be hurting anyone very much. But a school whose main function is to give the children attending a headstart over most children (and that is what the parents are paying many thousands for) is by definition harming the prospects of children who don't get the headstart.
I don't take the view that education is a zero-sum activity. Going to a Russell Group university, for example, undoubtedly enhances one's earning power, and people who go to such universities are disproportionately drawn from wealthy backgrounds. It does not follow that such universities should forfeit charitable status.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Which ones?
Go examine the accounts of the major charities. The actual spend on the charitable object is not the majority of their cash flow.
I'm not sure that I absolutely agree that averyone who sends their children to a private school is doing that for a headstart, for their children, either socially or academically. It may be true, in some cases, but it also become a not-that-helpful stereotype.
My , very liberal-minded, parents, sent me to a very liberal-minded public school, because I think they thought I would find intellectual and creative opportunities there that I wouldn't find at the school around the corner, and I think they were probably right. Nothing about my father suggested he was sort of person who was mainly motivated by getting a headstart over other people, though, and I don't think I do , either.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
Certainly not excusing it – that was a vile rant. But Fox clearly has mental health issues. He is not the first person to be sent – literally – mad by life in the commentariat goldfish bowl, and won't be the last.
I've zero interest in his mental health issues.
He shouldn't be given airtime by a broadcaster for this shit, though. With smirking presenter encouraging him.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
..and it hasn't been since 1868 at the latest. People who talk as if they're providing some great benefit to the wider population are being deeply disingenuous.
The contortions gone through on behalf of private schools are quite something.
'It's people who can afford it doing what they think is best for their kids, end of. And it's a free country.'
That's the essence of the argument for and it's a perfectly good one. No need to pretend they are a positive for society as a whole.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
Having worked in the charity field, there is often considerable resentment towards "unworthy" organisations getting charitable status.
I used to find that many people who worked for medical charities would get pissed off that animal charities had charitable status - one woman telling me she thought the donkeys at the Donkey Sanctuary should be turned into salami.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Which ones?
Go examine the accounts of the major charities. The actual spend on the charitable object is not the majority of their cash flow.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
Having worked in the charity field, there is often considerable resentment towards "unworthy" organisations getting charitable status.
I used to find that many people who worked for medical charities would get pissed off that animal charities had charitable status - one woman telling me she thought the donkeys at the Donkey Sanctuary should be turned into salami.
Indeed and I bet the animal charities are pissed off that the medical charities have it too, if they engage in legal animal testing.
That's why we have objective criteria and shouldn't pick and choose winners and losers.
If the Tories were to decide to target Oxfam and other left wing charities then people supporting targeting private schools (which are neither left nor right as whisperingoracle noted) would be crying murder over that.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Which ones?
Go examine the accounts of the major charities. The actual spend on the charitable object is not the majority of their cash flow.
OK but which ones? Like all of them? And if a charity spends £6 on fundraising to earn £10 and £4 goes to the charitable object is that so terrible?
Anyone betting that Trump and his two sons, being found by a court to have been engaged in a decade of fraud, will get even a tenth of the press coverage of Hunter Biden, unlawfully owning a gun for 11 days, 5 years ago?
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Which ones?
Go examine the accounts of the major charities. The actual spend on the charitable object is not the majority of their cash flow.
ITV News Politics @ITVNewsPolitics · 5h 'You are the daughter of an immigrant, someone who wanted to come to the UK to make a better life for themselves'
Suella Braverman tells @AnushkaAsthana it's 'offensive' that people say she should be pro-migration because she is 'the child of immigrants'
===
"What I am dealing with here is illegal migration."
But you are not are you because the whole system is a systemic mess after 13 years of saying it is fixed.
This is the classic thing where some on the Left engage in racism without really realising it because they assume minorities should politically agree with them, or they're not really minorities.
Also that the left gets surprised when anyone who is an immigrant isn’t in favour all unrestricted immigration of all forms.
Mind you, the same people worked very industriously to prevent any white Zimbabwean farmers coming to this country, when they were being illegally* pushed off their land at gun point.
The reason given for this was their culture would be incompatible with that of this country.
*as ruled by the black justices of the Zimbabwean Supreme Court, using the post independence law and constitution.
The main thing I took from that speech is that she doesn’t like gays.
Nonsense.
Being gay in a country where it’s a capital offence (and where that regularly occurs) not enough to claim asylum?
We can't take in any of the 8 billion people on the planet where human rights aren't fully respected in the way we'd like them to be. Hundreds of millions would qualify, and we couldn't take them all in. I also think it's gamed by those who aren't gay but claim to be to gain admission.
At present, we have a form of unchecked liberal idealism that refuses to recognise how starkly it clashes with reality, and unless we reform it there's a risk its brought down all around us.
I must agree here. The critical point is not the place of the individual refugee on a victim hierarchy. The critical point is the number of people we can realistically accommodate per year. We are currently planning on bringing in 500k-1m people per year, which is way beyond the number of living units we can construct. Whether it's train lines, airport terminals or migrant policy, 2020s politics is wilfully unable to construct realistic plans and carry them out and I am very tired of it.
We are currently planning to bring in 500k-1m a year, but they’re not all asylum seekers or refugees. Immigration for 2022 was 1.2 million. (Net immigration is lower because other people emigrated.) That includes 114k Ukrainian refugees, 52k from Hong Kong, 6k resettled refugees (Afghanistan etc.) and 76k asylum seekers (some of whom may eventually fail in their applications and be deported). (The figures, which are from the ONS, don’t include people coming over on small boats. They estimate most of these are counted as they’ve claimed asylum, but that there’s maybe 4k not counted.)
Most of the immigration figures are from people on work visas (non-EU 235k, those from EU counted differently) or study visas (non-EU 361k, the vast majority of whom will leave in due course).
If you are concerned with how many people we can accommodate, stop issuing work visas.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
..and it hasn't been since 1868 at the latest. People who talk as if they're providing some great benefit to the wider population are being deeply disingenuous.
The contortions gone through on behalf of private schools are quite something.
'It's people who can afford it doing what they think is best for their kids, end of. And it's a free country.'
That's the essence of the argument for and it's a perfectly good one. No need to pretend they are a positive for society as a whole.
If they are genuine charities doing genuine good work, then they are. Objectively.
Oxfam campaign on left wing political issues. They advocate left wing taxes. They also spend a smaller percentage of revenue on good works than many charitable schools do.
I wouldn't target them for their politics though, as they are objectively a charity, just like schools objectively are.
If it's fair game to start picking on charities we dislike, I nominate Oxfam next.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
In the tratidional type of charity, the donors donate money that is then spent on others usually unknown to the donors, and it is ceratinly a choice made by the charity itself. E.g. donating to a homeless hostel, you don't know who are recieving the charity.
For a private school: The people paying are paying for the beneft of a specific person. This is not donating it is buying
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
Having worked in the charity field, there is often considerable resentment towards "unworthy" organisations getting charitable status.
I used to find that many people who worked for medical charities would get pissed off that animal charities had charitable status - one woman telling me she thought the donkeys at the Donkey Sanctuary should be turned into salami.
Indeed and I bet the animal charities are pissed off that the medical charities have it too, if they engage in legal animal testing.
That's why we have objective criteria and shouldn't pick and choose winners and losers.
If the Tories were to decide to target Oxfam and other left wing charities then people supporting targeting private schools (which are neither left nor right as whisperingoracle noted) would be crying murder over that.
Some of the donors to Wood Green Animal Shelters were ... eccentric.
I remember at one fundraiser, I was eating chicken, and the woman sitting next to me peered at my plate, before remarking "I don't eat my friends." Then her neighbour said she hated cats, and couldn't understand why we rehomed them, rather than focusing exclusively on dogs.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
The question is whether the provision of education for a fee mostly to wealthy people should fall within the scope of charity. In my view it shouldn't.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
Yes. To take one example, the chief beneficiaries of Eton's charitable activities are "persons enrolled on a course of study provided by Eton College". Which is hilariously self-serving.
Are there any other charities were such a high proportion of the benefit goes to the donors? If so, we should maybe think about ending some of their tax breaks, too.
Anyone betting that Trump and his two sons, being found by a court to have been engaged in a decade of fraud, will get even a tenth of the press coverage of Hunter Biden, unlawfully owning a gun for 11 days, 5 years ago?
Or indeed his continuing incitements to political violence.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
In the tratidional type of charity, the donors donate money that is then spent on others usually unknown to the donors, and it is ceratinly a choice made by the charity itself. E.g. donating to a homeless hostel, you don't know who are recieving the charity.
For a private school: The people paying are paying for the beneft of a specific person. This is not donating it is buying
The two models are totally different.
Charity shops say you're wrong.
If I donate by buying a second hand product or service from paid staff and the net proceeds fund good works that's a charity, even if I benefit from my purchase.
If I buy from a second hand book store whose owner takes the profits as dividends, that's not a charity.
Again, private school fees don't just cover the pupils own education, they cover the schools good works too, whether that be bursaries, facilities donated to be shared with other schools etc
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
The question is whether the provision of education for a fee mostly to wealthy people should fall within the scope of charity. In my view it shouldn't.
Of course it should. First of all it saves the State money, providing the education that they would otherwise have to provide. Secondly, they invite the community to use the facilities, and a few lucky people from that community get to have their education sponsored by the charity.
Anyone betting that Trump and his two sons, being found by a court to have been engaged in a decade of fraud, will get even a tenth of the press coverage of Hunter Biden, unlawfully owning a gun for 11 days, 5 years ago?
Or indeed his continuing incitements to political violence.
Your defence of Hunter Biden is a bit cringe. Reminding us of his existence just isn't a good way to go about supporting the Dems (if that is your intention here).
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
If you're providing primary or secondary education, you can't qualify for charitable status. It's not difficult to decide that, the only question is whether or not it's the right thing to do.
Why not extend that to university education, which after all, provides benefits disproportionately towards the well-off?
ITV News Politics @ITVNewsPolitics · 5h 'You are the daughter of an immigrant, someone who wanted to come to the UK to make a better life for themselves'
Suella Braverman tells @AnushkaAsthana it's 'offensive' that people say she should be pro-migration because she is 'the child of immigrants'
===
"What I am dealing with here is illegal migration."
But you are not are you because the whole system is a systemic mess after 13 years of saying it is fixed.
This is the classic thing where some on the Left engage in racism without really realising it because they assume minorities should politically agree with them, or they're not really minorities.
Also that the left gets surprised when anyone who is an immigrant isn’t in favour all unrestricted immigration of all forms.
Mind you, the same people worked very industriously to prevent any white Zimbabwean farmers coming to this country, when they were being illegally* pushed off their land at gun point.
The reason given for this was their culture would be incompatible with that of this country.
*as ruled by the black justices of the Zimbabwean Supreme Court, using the post independence law and constitution.
The main thing I took from that speech is that she doesn’t like gays.
Nonsense.
Being gay in a country where it’s a capital offence (and where that regularly occurs) not enough to claim asylum?
We can't take in any of the 8 billion people on the planet where human rights aren't fully respected in the way we'd like them to be. Hundreds of millions would qualify, and we couldn't take them all in. I also think it's gamed by those who aren't gay but claim to be to gain admission.
At present, we have a form of unchecked liberal idealism that refuses to recognise how starkly it clashes with reality, and unless we reform it there's a risk its brought down all around us.
I must agree here. The critical point is not the place of the individual refugee on a victim hierarchy. The critical point is the number of people we can realistically accommodate per year. We are currently planning on bringing in 500k-1m people per year, which is way beyond the number of living units we can construct. Whether it's train lines, airport terminals or migrant policy, 2020s politics is wilfully unable to construct realistic plans and carry them out and I am very tired of it.
We are currently planning to bring in 500k-1m a year, but they’re not all asylum seekers or refugees. Immigration for 2022 was 1.2 million. (Net immigration is lower because some people e
He's been found liable for Civil Fraud, and his family have all had their rights to do businesses in NY cancelled. 10 days to appoint receivers for the NY based Trump businesses to dissolve them.
Plus restitution to be extracted on an estimated sum of $250 million.
Worse than that, it was handed down as a summary judgement by the judge (who campaigned for election on ‘getting Trump’), with no trial.
You don’t have to like the guy, to think there’s a concerted and co-ordinated effort going on to drown him in legal problems for the next year.
It’s a partial summary judgement; a trial still takes place. Trump can (and will) appeal the judgement. If he can prove a politicised decision, he’ll win on appeal.
The judgement is online. The rationale for the summary judgement is given. I found the judgement convincing. The paperwork is all there: Trump’s companies made up ridiculous inflated figures. Their defences for doing so don’t hold water.
Trump can afford the best lawyers. If he’s done nothing wrong, all these cases against him wouldn’t be an issue. The problem is he has done many things wrong. He keeps breaking the law. Maybe there wouldn’t be so many cases against him if hadn’t become President. But, you know, if you like to break the law, maybe don’t draw attention to yourself by running for President?
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
If you're providing primary or secondary education, you can't qualify for charitable status. It's not difficult to decide that, the only question is whether or not it's the right thing to do.
If I made use of an animal rescue charity, I'd be expected to pay a fee.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
"93% of parents don't pay."
Income tax, all the other taxes, VAT, council tax ...
And those of us who are not parents are paying to educate other people's children.
To avoid this, we need to have a higher tax rate for parents (a "brat tax"). Instead, we do they opposite and give them tax breaks and handouts.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Which ones?
Go examine the accounts of the major charities. The actual spend on the charitable object is not the majority of their cash flow.
Note: I'm staggered by how low those ratios seem to be - bursary expenditure <1% of fee income?! - so maybe I've read this all wrong - please correct me!
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
If you're providing primary or secondary education, you can't qualify for charitable status. It's not difficult to decide that, the only question is whether or not it's the right thing to do.
And tertiary?
Why can't you run it based on whether they're doing good works or not, whether they're paying dividends or not etc, ie traditional objective charity criteria?
Is it simply that you know they objectively are charities but dislike that, so want to change the answer?
Anyone betting that Trump and his two sons, being found by a court to have been engaged in a decade of fraud, will get even a tenth of the press coverage of Hunter Biden, unlawfully owning a gun for 11 days, 5 years ago?
Or indeed his continuing incitements to political violence.
Your defence of Hunter Biden is a bit cringe. Reminding us of his existence just isn't a good way to go about supporting the Dems (if that is your intention here).
I'm not defending Hunter Biden, you pillock.
I'm pointing out the absurd double standard in judging conduct of politicians - which Hunter Biden isn't.
You're even more of a pillock if you think anything I post here will make any difference at all to Democratic support.
I think the focus on charitable status for private schools isn't the central issue.
The question is whether children's education should be exempt from VAT, not least since these kids would otherwise be costing the state for their education. Personally I think it should. Same as if parents opt to have private tuition for their kids.
Incidentally, an acquaintance has taken one of his kids out of a local school and put her into private education because of some rather nasty bullying that the school could not, or refused, to combat.
Not everyone who sends their kids to private school are posh; many parents who send their kids to private school make sacrifices to do so - because they care for their kids.
Exactly my family's experience.
The State School was incapable of addressing, or dealing with, bullying - so my niece had to be pulled out and sent to a local small independent day school to ensure her welfare.
She eventually returned to the State Sector at the next educational stage, but obtaining appropriate aid (ie a Statement) required a couple of years of bureaucratic process including the need to attend meetings with a specialist barrister (at 4 figures a time), private medical reports and all the rest.
Far better to have tolerably affordable alternatives, which many parents can meet by not taking holidays, living in a smaller house etc if they choose to do so.
These are things that the Labour proposals, as far as I can see, have just not bothered thinking about (having read the supporting report) in their enthusiasm to trip over their own feet to pander to Neander.
Not something Mr Starmer should do to raise pin money when he also needs every vote he can get his hands on.
Well said.
There is a 'toff-bashing' attitude shown by many of those disliking private schools, but the true toffs will be able to afford increased fees no matter what, its those like you describe who will suffer the most from these proposals.
I count myself very fortunate, my kids have a place in a good primary school. We've moved since they started the school and the schools closest to us do not have such a good reputation, so we're keeping them in their old school and I'm driving them to their school. No fees thankfully, just petrol money, but their education comes first. I could relocate them from their school I drive to, to the one with a rough reputation they could walk to instead, but their education absolutely has to come first and inconveniencing me and costing me petrol money is a price I'm absolutely prepared to pay to ensure they continue to get a good education.
Too many others in the state sector aren't so fortunate. Too many have poor schools and not much they can do about it. "Fix that" is the obvious rallying cry, and yes that should be done, though the biggest difference in school behaviour is often not from funding, or the teachers, its the pupils parents surely and that's not so easy to fix?
For those of middle income, neither poor, nor well off, who find themselves lumbered with a bad school or a school that can't handle their child's needs, an affordable alternative should be available ideally. A Plan B so to speak.
For those who have enough money they don't need to worry about bills, they'll continue to get private education either way.
I'd have thought you'd be all in favour of the market. Remove the charity status, let schools charge the full economic rate and the ones delivering value will survive while the others fail, with parents deciding whether the higher fees are justified.
The charity status is there because what they're doing is charitable. They literally are charities, they're not businesses paying dividends to shareholders last I checked.
The core function of the sector is to provide a kind of 'gated community' in education for people with money. This is fine or not (depending on your politics) but it's hardly a charitable activity.
What's the core function of charity shops?
The sector offers free education to many pupils and other charitable services based on the funds they raise. How is that not charity?
If that money were being paid out in dividends to shareholders it would be a business. If its going to charitable services its a charity. That's a pretty clear definition to me.
Private schools do provide some free places, yes, but it's a tiny fraction. It has to be because they need the fee income to operate their gated community. That's the core function. The free places aspect is a sideshow. The core function of charity shops by contrast is to raise money for good works. It isn't to provide an exclusive retail space where monied people can browse and buy things, with a small handful of 'deserving' other folk allowed in if they pass a test on the door.
Sorry but there's no difference.
On the one hand you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works. On the other you have a charity that provides services for those who give it money, and uses some of that money to do good works.
They're both exactly the same.
The comparison would work if the granting of free places by private schools was their main function in life. But it isn't.
Many charities of the high street variety are actually large businesses that do a moderate amount of charity on the side.
Which ones?
Go examine the accounts of the major charities. The actual spend on the charitable object is not the majority of their cash flow.
OK but which ones? Like all of them? And if a charity spends £6 on fundraising to earn £10 and £4 goes to the charitable object is that so terrible?
There is no definition. There are even charities which do *no* charitable work. They lobby the government on the charitable object in question.
The problem is that we use charity to include non-profit organisations.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
Having worked in the charity field, there is often considerable resentment towards "unworthy" organisations getting charitable status.
I used to find that many people who worked for medical charities would get pissed off that animal charities had charitable status - one woman telling me she thought the donkeys at the Donkey Sanctuary should be turned into salami.
I take the opposite view. Charities that benefit humans are bottom of the list as far as I'm concerned.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
The question is whether the provision of education for a fee mostly to wealthy people should fall within the scope of charity. In my view it shouldn't.
Of course it should. First of all it saves the State money, providing the education that they would otherwise have to provide. Secondly, they invite the community to use the facilities, and a few lucky people from that community get to have their education sponsored by the charity.
Surely it would be fairer to tax the rich and provide a higher quality education to all children? Yours is a rather roundabout way of taking pressure off the state.
This is like when people go for private healthcare - you aren't taking any pressure off the system, you're just using your wealth to skip the queue.
Anyone betting that Trump and his two sons, being found by a court to have been engaged in a decade of fraud, will get even a tenth of the press coverage of Hunter Biden, unlawfully owning a gun for 11 days, 5 years ago?
Or indeed his continuing incitements to political violence.
Your defence of Hunter Biden is a bit cringe. Reminding us of his existence just isn't a good way to go about supporting the Dems (if that is your intention here).
I'm not defending Hunter Biden, you pillock.
I'm pointing out the absurd double standard in judging conduct of politicians - which Hunter Biden isn't.
You're even more of a pillock if you think anything I post here will make any difference at all to Democratic support.
Yes you are defending him, not for the first time recently. And no, of course your defence of the Bidens won't make any difference, but that doesn't mean you're not doing it.
I see that some folk are demanding that we maximise our reliance on oil from Russia and Saudi Arabia, rather than develop reserves in UK waters.
Given the meagre size of our remaining reserves, it would make more sense to save them for when they are really needed rather than squandering them now and leaving us completely reliant on Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future.
Which is a different argument to the "leave it in the ground" crowd.
Presumably fans of football clubs owned by the Middle East are in the "leave it in the ground" camp.
It makes no sense on environmental, economic or security grounds to burn up our last remaining oil reserves. Doing so will reduce incentives to develop cleaner alternatives while also leaving us completely at the mercy of foreign suppliers of hydrocarbons for plastics, fertilisers, etc. in the future. It reeks of greed, short-termism and political opportunism and plays directly into the hands of our enemies.
Except these are not our last remaining reserves. We have other remaining reserves untapped even after this.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
Our remaining reserves are insignificant compared with those possessed by Russia and Saudi Arabia. Squandering our reserves now will only hand more power to those countries with large reserves in the future. If you want to know who the Putinist idiots are, look in the direction of those who have done their best to keep us reliant on the sale and consumption of fossil fuels.
Compared to Russia or Saudi Arabia is utterly irrelevant. The question is what our remaining reserves our compared to what we could need in the future and the truth is we have a healthy reserve it's not being squandered.
I absolutely support phasing down the consumption of fossil fuels, and said so myself. Production is unrelated to that.
What percentage of oil production is used for fuel as opposed to medicines, plastics and the rest?
Would some people be against it even if none of the oil ended up being burned?
I once looked this up about 15 years ago. The vast majority of fossil oil is burnt in one way or the other. The figure IFAICR is between 85 and 90% burnt and 10-15% for any other purpose.
Anyone betting that Trump and his two sons, being found by a court to have been engaged in a decade of fraud, will get even a tenth of the press coverage of Hunter Biden, unlawfully owning a gun for 11 days, 5 years ago?
Or indeed his continuing incitements to political violence.
Your defence of Hunter Biden is a bit cringe. Reminding us of his existence just isn't a good way to go about supporting the Dems (if that is your intention here).
I'm not defending Hunter Biden, you pillock.
I'm pointing out the absurd double standard in judging conduct of politicians - which Hunter Biden isn't.
You're even more of a pillock if you think anything I post here will make any difference at all to Democratic support.
Yes you are defending him, not for the first time recently. And no, of course your defence of the Bidens won't make any difference, but that doesn't mean you're not doing it.
Nope.
And your inability to distinguish between the President and his son is characteristic.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
Having worked in the charity field, there is often considerable resentment towards "unworthy" organisations getting charitable status.
I used to find that many people who worked for medical charities would get pissed off that animal charities had charitable status - one woman telling me she thought the donkeys at the Donkey Sanctuary should be turned into salami.
A friend of mine who was a solicitor working in wills and probate had to bite his tongue hard when clients asked that donkey sanctuaries be put in their will (not his place to try to persuade the client to dispose of their assets in another way but he thought it was silly).
Nothing against donkeys, but they do incredibly well through bequests because for some not so mysterious reason older people feel a tremendous sense of affinity with the poor old beasts who have worked hard all their life and now want a nice retirement on the south coast. That's fine but the level of support is out of all proportion to the scale of the problem.
Guide Dogs for the Blind are another one. Again, a perfectly worthy cause and this is in no way a criticism of the work they do, but they get a lot of money in bequests because they sit in the sweet spot between a medical condition that people feel a lot of empathy with and an animal that people like. Yet actual demand for guide dogs isn't really that huge due to advances in medical treatments.
Charities are sometimes made by the Charities Commission to disperse reserves to other charities in the sector if they build up too massive a cash pile. But there is still resentment about that a few charities are absolutely loaded (and some charity employees/managers have a pretty sweet deal) whereas a lot aren't in a way that has limited relation to the objective value of the work the charity is doing.
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
If you're providing primary or secondary education, you can't qualify for charitable status. It's not difficult to decide that, the only question is whether or not it's the right thing to do.
Why not extend that to university education, which after all, provides benefits disproportionately towards the well-off?
Universities have a separate function in terms of research which makes mapping between secondary and tertiary a little more complicated
Not that complicated.
If you're being consistent, presumably you want £9,500 tuition fees undergraduates currently pay to become £11,400? Ie 9500+20%
Also, can someone tell me how much of a charity's income needs to go towards charitable efforts; how much income they can spend on salaries and overheads, and who checks this?
And can that please be expanded to all charities. Many of the larger charities, those that advertise on TV (although mostly at reduced rates), have massive overheads, large offices, and plenty of executives on six-figure salaries.
But they don't generally allocate their services of the basis of recipients' ability to pay for those services, but rather on need.
If I was to set up an education charity, providing schools, I'd be looking to target it at the areas where all the local schools are shit and no one can afford to pay. Not to the parents (like myself) who live in areas where all the local state schools are actually very good and going private, at a bottom end private school, would potentially be a viable option finance-wise.
That's funny, I was just in an Age Concern shop over the weekend where we picked up some second hand books for my kids - and they weren't doling them out, they were very much allocating who could leave with the stock based upon the recipients ability to pay for those services.
Most large charities fundraise in no small part based on ability to pay.
The ones paying (myself buying a book, parents of pupils who are paying) aren't the ones receiving the charity, the ones who are receiving the charity is others.
Second hand books in Age Concern shops tend to cost a lot less than private school fees…
Thing is, I don't really care how tax efficient your system is, if your system is working towards a caste system.
Could equally be argued to be a liberal system. State provides education but doesn't mandate that everyone uses it. I support the private option but am amenable to tax being levied on fees, but 20% would do a lot of damage all round I think.
It's just a machine for generation inequality. I mean, obviously it is. That's why people are willing to pay so much money for it. A liberal system would see parental choice and it being free at the point of use. Oversubscriptions get decided by lottery not by how fat your wallet is. Oversubscribed schools get big government grants to expand.
We have that, which is why my kids go to their good state school I can drive them to rather than the closest state school that has not got such a good reputation.
Not everyone is fortunate enough to get a place in a good school though and for those who are of a middle income (not exceptionally well off, not exceptionally poor) should they be penalised for prioritising their kids education as a Plan B to a state system that has let them down?
Fix the state system is a nice idea, but since the problem begins at home and its bad parenting more than bad funding that leads to rough schools (indeed rough state schools often have a higher funding per pupil than good state schools) then fixing that is not easy.
Plan A should be to get a good free education, why not? But if that fails, should parents be banned from paying for a Plan B?
The fact that not everyone is fortunate enough to go to a good school is not an argument for deciding the allocation on this or that basis. It's an argument for sorting out the bad schools. If there are bad schools, SOMEONE needs to be penalised. If the answer to the "who" question is "well, the poor, obviously" then it's class warfare. If the answer is "it might be you or it might not be" that's fairer and perhaps will have the added benefit of spurring on political pressure to sort any problems out.
The people who send their kids to private school have, on average, a disproportionate amount of political power. They're the ones who can fix this. They just need a little self-interested incentive.
But allocation is not decided on this or that basis. 93% of pupils, like my own daughters, go to state schools.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
If we're talking about specialist schools that cater for special needs then I support their existence and selection based on qualifying special needs. Clearly some children need a tailored school experience to mitigate their own personal disadvantages.
I don't see why parents should be made to pay for that though.
In some ways this reminds me of accessibility features. Some of us don't need specialist infrastructure, others do. We wouldn't expect a surcharge for wheelchair users in a supermarket even though there are architectural features that have been included specifically to cater for them. We absorb the extra cost as a community because that's what equality of opportunity is about.
93% of parents don't pay.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Paying VAT =/= being punished.
Paying VAT for what is objectively a charity and meets all objective definitions of a charity sure is.
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
See, I would modify what counts as a charity to specifically exclude private schools.
How? Objectively, without referring to schooling, simply based on objective criteria of what a charity does in good works, and how a charity fundraises, then how do you objectively modify that?
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
Having worked in the charity field, there is often considerable resentment towards "unworthy" organisations getting charitable status.
I used to find that many people who worked for medical charities would get pissed off that animal charities had charitable status - one woman telling me she thought the donkeys at the Donkey Sanctuary should be turned into salami.
Indeed and I bet the animal charities are pissed off that the medical charities have it too, if they engage in legal animal testing.
That's why we have objective criteria and shouldn't pick and choose winners and losers.
If the Tories were to decide to target Oxfam and other left wing charities then people supporting targeting private schools (which are neither left nor right as whisperingoracle noted) would be crying murder over that.
The skepticism about the donkey sanctuary seems fully justified to me, given their turbo-anthropomorphism and suffering-porn-heartstring-tugging adverts.
The only animal charity I can think of that I think is notably worse is Penn Farthing's Nowzad, his activities screwing around with the evacuation from Afghanistan, and his flying dogs around the world on airlines to find them new mummies and daddies. However, there may be others. It's a problem of being a nation of animal sentimentalists imo.
But none of this justifies creating an eloi/morlock caste system. Choice should be available to all, not just people with £££.
I reckon you can tell with a very high level of accuracy which regulars on here had a public school education just from their contributions.
Name the future pb.com posters. L-R
I always love that photo. Plainly the boys on the right are having lots of fun taking the piss out of the Etonians.
They are Harrovians not Etonians.
Little known fact however that this was nothing to do with showing a class difference it was just a coincidence that the Planters Peanut advert auditions clashed with the Hovis delivery boy auditions that day.
Anyone betting that Trump and his two sons, being found by a court to have been engaged in a decade of fraud, will get even a tenth of the press coverage of Hunter Biden, unlawfully owning a gun for 11 days, 5 years ago?
Or indeed his continuing incitements to political violence.
Your defence of Hunter Biden is a bit cringe. Reminding us of his existence just isn't a good way to go about supporting the Dems (if that is your intention here).
I'm not defending Hunter Biden, you pillock.
I'm pointing out the absurd double standard in judging conduct of politicians - which Hunter Biden isn't.
You're even more of a pillock if you think anything I post here will make any difference at all to Democratic support.
Yes you are defending him, not for the first time recently. And no, of course your defence of the Bidens won't make any difference, but that doesn't mean you're not doing it.
Nope.
And your inability to distinguish between the President and his son is characteristic.
Neil Henderson @hendopolis · 15m MAIL: Labour’s class war begins on Day One #TomorrowsPapersToday
===
"Backlash as parents face school fees hike"
How many Mail readers send their kids to private school???
It is not just the mail going onto the attack
The i as well
Sorry the link didn't work
The Mail tries its best to make it sound like Labour will be charging a new fee for all parents . Not sure the I headline will worry Labour . A backlash from private schools . 93% of children do not go to private schools . They get a subsidy in effect from tax payers whilst state schools are crumbling. Do you want your taxes subsiding rich parennts sending their kids to places like Eton .
That will be the Labour campaign.
Of course, the exact opposite is true.
Every parent who sends their child to private school is effectively paying double - they are paying all the tax for a state school place, but not taking it up, thereby donating the resources they would have used so they are available for everyone else instead. Meanwhile, they expand the level of investment going into the education sector overall, funding the training of more teachers, experimenting with new education styles, more resources and facilities, rather than spend it on property and consumption. Which is where they money would otherwise go. And private schools are charitable endeavours that don't generate profit or return to investors but invest in an educational mission overall.
This is why governments of all stripes have recognised this in the tax system for decades - because it's in the public interest. They are a net good.
It won't be Eton, Harrow or Winchester hit by these changes. It will be the smaller more marginal private schools where two parents working full-time - doctors, accountants, pilots, solicitors, and small businessmen - work hard to be able to afford the fees are forced to pull their kids out, with the school closing and the community assets lost. The state system won't gain a bean from it except an additional burden and the education sector overall will shrink. We'll all be poorer for it.
It's a disgrace of a policy based on prejudice. It deserves to fail, as all bad policies should.
This is spot on. (Even if Casino thinks I’m a “Leftie”.)
The big name public schools will sail on regardless. The ones that will be hit will be the small ones with the specialisms in autism support or music or whatever, where the parents have scrimped and saved to send their kids because they’ve been failed by the state system.
If your position is “well improve the state system so it caters for those kids” that’s an honest position to take… and also I have a bridge to sell you. You have a look at the EHCP backlog for any given local authority and tell me how long that’s going to take.
Really it’s not that fricking hard (and here is where Casino will conclude I am in fact a Leftie). Tax wealth, rather than taxing people when they choose to spend that wealth on good things like education. A couple of pence on income tax for the super-rich would dwarf anything raised by VAT on school fees.
But Starmer won’t do that. It’s tokenism rather than genuine redistribution, at the expense of kids’ education.
What a load of shite. This is closing a tax loophole on a tax that is levied on pretty much everything else.
If VAT on private school fees already existed nobody would be campaigning to remove it.
There are huge swathes of the UK economy which are exempt from VAT.
Start with £250bn sales of food. - that's retail consumer sales, What about purchases of food by businesses - no idea on that. Add in segments of the clothing market - children incl. school uniforms. Then all businesses turning over less than £85k a year (approx figure). Reduced VAT on energy bills at 5%. (Energy bills = £50bn to £100bn a year at present) Medicines and medical devices, including I think Motability cars (Motability do £4bn of business a year). Then there's a whole bundle of non-VAT or reduced rate VAT exemptions for charities. Financial services.
And it goes on...
No precise idea on the total, but it looks to me as if perhaps 15-20% of GDP is VAT exempt.
I think this is the important point that both sides are perhaps avoiding. Whether VAT is charged on an activity is often arbitrary and not consistent with similar products or services.
So whether private school fees should be chargeable cannot be resolved by considering whether they are a "genuine" charity or not, or if they are good or bad for society. It is rather a political and fiscal choice without a correct answer either way, and it is a matter of preference rather than charging VAT is right or wrong.
Politically I think it is an own goal by Labour, although probably most helpful to the LDems rather than the Cons. Fiscally I think it is the correct decision.
I think it's likely to work politically, precisely because it's the politics rather than the fiscal aspect that is driving it. This policy appeals to the left in Labour and also polls well with floating voters, esp in the sort of seats needed to win the GE. There aren't many policies like that. It's a rare bird. This imo is why it's not only going in the manifesto but is being given a reasonably high profile.
I'd wager that the vast majority of the population couldn't give a toss about private education and never think about it. It's a very first world problem. Tax it, don't tax it, the rich / Tories will just find a way to shovel the money back to their gang anyway.
Comments
If Starmer's proposals eventually emerge from the other end of legal action, the first will have been curtailed and the latter may well have gone.
AFAICS the intellectual underpinnings of the policy have not considered the value of either, and the cost that will be required to repair the damage, seriously.
A more sensible policy would be something like means tested tax relief on Independent School Fees for parents of more modest means, and seeking greater integration of the sectors.
But that would be prioritising education quality over ideology, which won't do on this issue.
It makes no sense to be importing from dictatorships when we have our own reserves.
For environmental reasons we need to reduce consumption.
Anyone who proposes reducing production doesn't give a single damn about the planet, they're just Putinist idiots.
Brown eventually learned to play that role (with Mandelson's help), and saved Labour from outright disaster in 2010. And even amidst the carnage of 1997, the Tory faces that I remember - Major, Clarke, Mawhinney - held it together enough to do much better than the polls had been suggesting.
But Sunak's too wobbly. Dither, dither, dither, handbrake turn, denial, dither, confirmation, crash, retreat, flames, screaming. Over and over again. No matter how popular any one move happens to be with the base, he'll chuck the benefit away by lurching in a different direction soon afterwards. How can he possibly get through a campaign?
Someone with no long-term leadership ambitions might fit the bill. Hunt? It's a pity that Wallace and Sharma are retiring. My god, even Shapps would do a better job of just picking a line and sticking to it.
I don't think they will, but I do think they probably should.
What's the breakdown of the other 7%? I imagine maybe 5% are wealthy enough to simply want private education and will pay for it either way, while maybe 2% are situational dependent and people who have chosen to privately educate their kids because of circumstances.
Should that approximately 1/50 pupils turning to a Plan B have the Plan B denied to them?
You're absolutely kidding yourself if you think anyone wealthy enough to pay for private school fees is going to end up at a sink school instead. The money they're spending on fees could easily go on rent or mortgage for a good schools catchment area instead.
..The media regulator, Ofcom, which has struggled to deal with GB News pushing the boundaries (sic) of British television regulation, said it was urgently looking into a large number of complaints about Fox’s comments...
And how does that objective definition not apply to the main function of charity shops being retail rather than charity?
The headmaster has just moved to run the umbrella group of schools. He is going to continue the same plan there.
When I asked “why stop at 25%?”, he said that was just the first stage…
The reasoning is interesting - rather than just end up with a narrower and narrower entry set, it’s about building a broader social structure. For the benefit of the richer kids as much as the bursary kids.
I absolutely support phasing down the consumption of fossil fuels, and said so myself. Production is unrelated to that.
I see Sunak is still polling ahead of his party. And who are they going to replace him with?
So whether private school fees should be chargeable cannot be resolved by considering whether they are a "genuine" charity or not, or if they are good or bad for society. It is rather a political and fiscal choice without a correct answer either way, and it is a matter of preference rather than charging VAT is right or wrong.
Politically I think it is an own goal by Labour, although probably most helpful to the LDems rather than the Cons. Fiscally I think it is the correct decision.
That some do is their choice and each will have different reasons.
If a child is being bullied that should be stopped but if a middle income parent decides to take their kid out of a system that's let them down, rather than taking their kid on a holiday in August, should they be punished or banned from doing that?
Prices ought to come down to bring those numbers into balance. 👍
Yes, that’s right. Show up for for work and get told that enough people are doing your job for free….
Income tax, all the other taxes, VAT, council tax ...
If the school is a business not a charity and paying dividends to shareholders not using it's net proceeds for charitable purposes like any other charity does then it should have VAT.
Would some people be against it even if none of the oil ended up being burned?
I'm currently looking at various options of secondary schools for my eldest as she's in Year 5 so we will need to make our choices next year. All state sector. Again I'm prioritising quality over convenience/distance.
Ukraine in talks to join NATO-standard ASCOD armored vehicle production
The ASCOD platform can be equipped with various armaments like the MK 44 Bushmaster 30/40mm automatic guns, 105mm or 120mm gun turrets, and anti-tank guided missile systems.
https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1706970023850299447
My , very liberal-minded, parents, sent me to a very liberal-minded public school, because I think they thought I would find intellectual and creative opportunities there that I wouldn't find at the school around the corner, and I think they were probably right. Nothing about my father suggested he was sort of person who was mainly motivated by getting a headstart over other people, though, and I don't think I do , either.
If a school uses a higher percentage of it's funds for objective good works than say Oxfam does, would it remain a charity or be excluded in your world?
He shouldn't be given airtime by a broadcaster for this shit, though.
With smirking presenter encouraging him.
'It's people who can afford it doing what they think is best for their kids, end of. And it's a free country.'
That's the essence of the argument for and it's a perfectly good one. No need to pretend they are a positive for society as a whole.
I used to find that many people who worked for medical charities would get pissed off that animal charities had charitable status - one woman telling me she thought the donkeys at the Donkey Sanctuary should be turned into salami.
https://www.oxfam.org.uk/documents/639/Oxfam_Annual_Report_and_Accounts_2021_22.pdf
Happy to look at any other specific examples, but Oxfam was the first major that came to mind.
That's why we have objective criteria and shouldn't pick and choose winners and losers.
If the Tories were to decide to target Oxfam and other left wing charities then people supporting targeting private schools (which are neither left nor right as whisperingoracle noted) would be crying murder over that.
https://www.channel4.com/news/oxfam-whistleblower-allegations-of-rape-and-sex-in-exchange-for-aid
Most of the immigration figures are from people on work visas (non-EU 235k, those from EU counted differently) or study visas (non-EU 361k, the vast majority of whom will leave in due course).
If you are concerned with how many people we can accommodate, stop issuing work visas.
Oxfam campaign on left wing political issues. They advocate left wing taxes.
They also spend a smaller percentage of revenue on good works than many charitable schools do.
I wouldn't target them for their politics though, as they are objectively a charity, just like schools objectively are.
If it's fair game to start picking on charities we dislike, I nominate Oxfam next.
Name the future pb.com posters. L-R
For a private school: The people paying are paying for the beneft of a specific person. This is not donating it is buying
The two models are totally different.
I remember at one fundraiser, I was eating chicken, and the woman sitting next to me peered at my plate, before remarking "I don't eat my friends." Then her neighbour said she hated cats, and couldn't understand why we rehomed them, rather than focusing exclusively on dogs.
Are there any other charities were such a high proportion of the benefit goes to the donors? If so, we should maybe think about ending some of their tax breaks, too.
Trump’s threats to Milley fuel fears he’ll seek vengeance in second term
https://thehill.com/policy/defense/4224405-trumps-threats-to-milley-fuel-fears-hell-seek-vengeance-in-second-term/
If I donate by buying a second hand product or service from paid staff and the net proceeds fund good works that's a charity, even if I benefit from my purchase.
If I buy from a second hand book store whose owner takes the profits as dividends, that's not a charity.
Again, private school fees don't just cover the pupils own education, they cover the schools good works too, whether that be bursaries, facilities donated to be shared with other schools etc
No good works? They're not a charity then.
The judgement is online. The rationale for the summary judgement is given. I found the judgement convincing. The paperwork is all there: Trump’s companies made up ridiculous inflated figures. Their defences for doing so don’t hold water.
Trump can afford the best lawyers. If he’s done nothing wrong, all these cases against him wouldn’t be an issue. The problem is he has done many things wrong. He keeps breaking the law. Maybe there wouldn’t be so many cases against him if hadn’t become President. But, you know, if you like to break the law, maybe don’t draw attention to yourself by running for President?
They still talk about it.
Korea sees record-low births in July
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/biz/2023/09/126_360168.html
The number of births has pretty well halved in the last eight years.
To avoid this, we need to have a higher tax rate for parents (a "brat tax"). Instead, we do they opposite and give them tax breaks and handouts.
https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-search/-/charity-details/306983/accounts-and-annual-returns
(I'm not sure whether I'm reading this at all right, so happy to be corrected)
Fee income: £253M
Main bursary fund expenditure: £1.8M
(there are some other scholarships, if I read correctly they could boost to ~£2M/year expenditure)
Note: I'm staggered by how low those ratios seem to be - bursary expenditure <1% of fee income?! - so maybe I've read this all wrong - please correct me!
Why can't you run it based on whether they're doing good works or not, whether they're paying dividends or not etc, ie traditional objective charity criteria?
Is it simply that you know they objectively are charities but dislike that, so want to change the answer?
I'm pointing out the absurd double standard in judging conduct of politicians - which Hunter Biden isn't.
You're even more of a pillock if you think anything I post here will make any difference at all to Democratic support.
Look at this Portsmouth FC fan: https://e4p7c9i3.stackpathcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/14-23.jpg?iv=644
The question is whether children's education should be exempt from VAT, not least since these kids would otherwise be costing the state for their education. Personally I think it should. Same as if parents opt to have private tuition for their kids.
The problem is that we use charity to include non-profit organisations.
This is like when people go for private healthcare - you aren't taking any pressure off the system, you're just using your wealth to skip the queue.
And your inability to distinguish between the President and his son is characteristic.
Nothing against donkeys, but they do incredibly well through bequests because for some not so mysterious reason older people feel a tremendous sense of affinity with the poor old beasts who have worked hard all their life and now want a nice retirement on the south coast. That's fine but the level of support is out of all proportion to the scale of the problem.
Guide Dogs for the Blind are another one. Again, a perfectly worthy cause and this is in no way a criticism of the work they do, but they get a lot of money in bequests because they sit in the sweet spot between a medical condition that people feel a lot of empathy with and an animal that people like. Yet actual demand for guide dogs isn't really that huge due to advances in medical treatments.
Charities are sometimes made by the Charities Commission to disperse reserves to other charities in the sector if they build up too massive a cash pile. But there is still resentment about that a few charities are absolutely loaded (and some charity employees/managers have a pretty sweet deal) whereas a lot aren't in a way that has limited relation to the objective value of the work the charity is doing.
If you're being consistent, presumably you want £9,500 tuition fees undergraduates currently pay to become £11,400? Ie 9500+20%
The only animal charity I can think of that I think is notably worse is Penn Farthing's Nowzad, his activities screwing around with the evacuation from Afghanistan, and his flying dogs around the world on airlines to find them new mummies and daddies. However, there may be others. It's a problem of being a nation of animal sentimentalists imo.
(Is donkey salami tasty?)
Little known fact however that this was nothing to do with showing a class difference it was just a coincidence that the Planters Peanut advert auditions clashed with the Hovis delivery boy auditions that day.