Just this week I wrote of my dissatisfaction with journalists giving Labour an easy ride on its “stress tests” and allowing Keir Starmer wrongly to assert there are “no reports” indicating a migration from the independent to the free taxpayer-funded sector following a 20% price hike.
I’m not a massive GB News viewer, but the more people complain about it the more I’m glad it exists. Actually, over Christmas with Mum I watched an enchanting GB News programme with professional musicians trying out exquisite violins, cellos and pianos and talking about them. No overpaid dumbing-down dimwit newly-graduated from children’s telly, no special effects or jingles, just simple production with interesting people talking and playing their instruments, as I sensed it, directly to me.
Back to the subject: here’s a great three minute 45 second GB News clip from Camilla Tominey.
I don’t know about you, but Bridget Phillipson (Shadow Education Secretary) doesn’t fill me with confidence as she recites the gospel according to the IFS in defence of the state producer’s interest. You can hear her concern for the state schools which (she says) are “very sadly” demographically projected to be short of pupils, while she shows total disinterest in the effect on independent schools, families and most importantly children. She’s on about “tax breaks” and repeatedly fails to respond even to the “best case” 20,000 migration in light of current teacher and classroom shortages.
I could start watching more of this. Camilla, give me a call and I’ll give you much more ammo for your next barrage.
I don’t want to get into the immigration debate (nor do I even have very strong views about it) but the track record of local authorities predicting and responding to changing demand for school places isn’t exactly stellar. In theory we have a handle on who is born and expect to give them a school place a few years later; we are much less good at knowing who is arriving next year by boat or on a student visa, and we definitely don’t know how schools and families will respond to a 20% tax hike. It’s been painful for immigrant families and for their neighbours, all of which is regrettable. My impression is Phillipson’s okay with the VAT pain as long as she’s hurting ‘the rich’.
I wonder if British families no longer able and willing to pay school fees will be offered a good place at a decent state school that ‘works’ for their domestic and professional arrangements, so that they can continue being significant taxpayers without the deadweight cost of an unnecessary house move? Or will it suffice, in Bridget Phillipson’s opinion, for their local authority to give them ‘any place’ given all the good state schools are, as Tominey reminds her, chock-full? That could have bearing on my main bugbear – wondering if moderately affluent people will still choose the inconvenience of work once they start receiving kids’ education for free paid-for by taxpayers.
Or will there be a place at all?
What’s also revealing is Phillipson’s commentary that independent schools can instead “make savings”, having put fees up above inflation (around 20% in real terms over 12 years). As I’ve explained, if the schools absorb the VAT increase, there’s much less money in it for Labour, and some schools will very likely still have to close.
I know somebody else who has put fees up. Up by 20% in real terms in just four years, and slated to keep rising. To paraphrase Bridget Phillipson, surely this is unaffordable for her constituents as well as for GB News viewers?
That’s right, I’m talking about the Government, where although we can sack the boss, we can’t escape paying the next one. Can we look forward to Government cutting its cloth, as she is demanding of the private sector? I’m guessing not. What’s ours is hers, and what’s hers is hers. Clause 4 stuff.
Now I’m not in this for party politics. I’m just calling for the Labour Party to adopt an education policy that is consistent with the modern, competent, innovative future Starmer “I want independent schools to thrive” and Rachel Reeves “taxation will not lead to prosperity” talk about. That means not harming children and families, not pitting working families against each other and not harming good schools.
I’m struggling to square that with what this interview suggests: bad old-fashioned “public ownership of production”. Perhaps they’ll have a re-think.
Mr. Chips is a pseudonym for an employee of a private school. He writes on Substack.
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How does this policy attract more voters?
How is it in anyone’s interest?
Justice will not be served until nobody in the world has any privileges. You know it makes sense.
‘Anti-individualistic, the Fascist conception of life stresses the importance of the State and accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with those of the State, which stands for the conscience and the universal, will of man as a historic entity.
It is opposed to classical liberalism which arose as a reaction to absolutism and exhausted its historical function when the State became the expression of the conscience and will of the people.
Liberalism denied the State in the name of the individual; Fascism reasserts’
Mussolini 1932
Nobody except the elites.
It suits the bitter and jealous.
It may not attract more votes, but to the hard core lefties who hate rich people, it makes it look like Labour are on the side of the working class and putting a stop to all the snobs getting a better education than them.
Labour is being led by a rich man. His London home and his ghuge tax payer funded pension are worth millions.
Yep you know that and I know that but many voters still think Labour represents ordinary people (whatever that is supposed to mean)
Most of the “hard core lefties” I know ARE rich (relatively).
In my experience it’s the “hard core lefty elite” that send their children to these schools as they are the only ones that can afford it!
Hi. 2. It’s not! Won’t raise money and won’t make state schools better. 1. A few people like it because the harm to independent schools isn’t a harm, it’s the whole point.
More people are currently persuaded by Labour’s “unfair tax break” rubbish and what sounds like loads of money coming their school’s way. I am doing my best to correct this misleading story. Thanks.
The last few years have had a profound impact on how I think. The serf’s stay serf’s, and the lord’s stay lord’s, as long as there is a class division in the quality of education. That is not what I want. I want to raze to the ground the class system, and the political system that supports the class system. Until that is done there will always be proles and their masters. However, I remain – admittedly, in a much diluted form – a capitalist. A kind of restricted capitalism is, I suppose, what I’d endorse – one that doesn’t have class privilege at its roots, and one that caps the amount of wealth any one person can accumulate.
There is no class division in the quality of education.
Some families prioritize education over everything else and are prepared to pay for it. Some prefer to spend their money on other things.
If private education is made too expensive, more families will choose the state sector and game the exam system, as many do already, by using the money they save to pay for private tuition.
That means even less money per pupil in the state sector.
If you cap the amount of wealth an individual can accumulate, those with political power will simply use it to advantage themselves in other ways, state dachas in the best neighbourhoods, country clubs exclusively for party members, for example.
For many, family and friends come first, wealth a long way second. Many over achievers are also philanthropists.
Democratic capitalism has demonstrated itself to be the biggest force for improvement in the life chances of the many worldwide.
Socialist fascism has done the opposite.
I believe that what most call ‘social democracy’ is in fact large state totalitarian socialism (socialist fascism) as exemplified by lockdowns, vaccine mandates etc.
A smaller state, larger private sector, less state spending, lower taxes, will, I think, lead to higher economic growth and more prosperity.
A mixed education system allowing parents more choice is part of that.
Some of what you say I agree with, some of it I do not.
“There is no class division in the quality of education.”. Sorry, but that is utter nonsense. As you’d know if you grew up in a very working class area where both parents worked, but still struggled to put food on the table and still pay the bills.
With respect restriction of wealth: I’d like you to consider why we now live in a society where a small number of ultra-rich people control our current and future lives by controlling governments and all institutions? By capping individual wealth, and redirecting excess wealth back into the system, more people are enriched and the gap between rich and poor, unimportant and influential, narrows.
There is division in the quality of education but it is not a class division.
Some state schools in deprived areas are outstanding, better results than most private schools. Michaela community school is but one example. But many are not. That is a consequence of the incompetence of those running the worst schools; nothing to do with class.
And what do think allows people to guarantee a good education? If your point was that the goal should be to raise all schools to the standard of private schools, but then I’d agree with you. But, what would then be the purpose of private schools? Wealth will always provide key advantages that will feed back into the wealthy, creating a perennial divide that is based on class. I didn’t think that was such a controversial fact tbh. Anyway, I see I’m p*ssing in the wind here, so…
Nothing allows people to guarantee a good education.
Famous criminals from Eton include John Bingham, murderer, and Darius Guppy, fraudster. There will have been many more.
‘….(Etonians) who had done particularly badly in their end-of-term exams would be given the title of ‘GTF’, short for ‘General Total Failure’……the teacher……would publicly call out the GTFs’ names in front of 250 of their peers.’
Spear’s July 2018
The purpose of private schools is, essentially, the teaching of ‘humanism’: ‘a democratic and ethical life stance, which affirms that human beings have the right and responsibility to give meaning and shape to their own lives.’ Many parents prefer to teach that themselves and save the money for other things. After all, if a parent simply wants the best chance for their children to get into Oxford or Cambridge today, a state school is by far and away their best bet,
Brampton Manor Academy, an inner-city state school in East Ham, received more Oxbridge offers than Eton College.
Nothing to do with class or ‘white privilege’:
‘For the whole of England, multiple non-white groups, including those of Bangladeshi, Pakistani and black-African heritage, outperformed their white-British peers.’
Spiked Aug. 2023
One of the big advantages of private schools is that parents have far more of a say, so even if teaching standards at state schools are the same as those at private schools, that bigger say would still be true.
Good luck with trying to collect VAT on private tuition.
My father was a lowly clerk, but when my brother was almost destroyed in the local sink school, my mother went back to work (very unfashionable in the 1950s, and also as a lowly clerk) to pay for private primary education for him, and then for me. No more cars, and no holidays in hotels, whilst that lasted.
Fortunately the State paid for both of us to have a grammar school education, and for me to have a university place. But Labour did away with grammar schools a bit later, and my kids got loans, not grants, for college.
None of that is related to class, but the political changes are related to envy – and ideological envy at that, given how many socialists I knew at Cambridge were nth generation Public School types.
Yes, Labour led the closure of grammar schools but I am sure I read somewhere that Mrs Thatcher closed as many as Labour.
You seem to not be barking up the wrong tree, but trying to bark up several different trees at once.
Not at all. But non-approved thinking isn’t for everyone. My point is this: unrestricted capitalism has got us into the censorious, totalitarian, society we’re now living in. Communism, or even socialism, will certainly do exactly the same thing. So what’s the answer? Some kind of middle ground maybe? Personally, I’d rip up the entire system and go back to small, self-governing communities, but that’s an impossible dream.
Britain hasn’t had unrestricted capitalism probably since the state took over the East India Company in 1858.
What did the Victorians ever do for us (or the entire world)?
I assume you want to ignore these UK multi-billionaires?
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/sunday-times-rich-list
And your point about not being able to guarantee a good education is just being pedantic. I’ll correct just for you then: “And what do think allows people to all but guarantee a good education?”. Maybe an excess of wealth is not something you’ve ever had to consider to be a problem?
“unrestricted capitalism has got us into this censorious, totalitarian society we’re now living in”. ——You then say communism will do the same thing. So you are really saying that capitalism and communism are much the same. —-We are all entitled to our opinions. But I really don’t know what you are talking about.
Well, if you don’t understand my very basic point, then I don’t think there’s any way I can help you. I’ll try to give you a clue though: both systems will ultimately lead to a small number of individuals controlling people, society, agriculture and economics. One is just done under the illusion of ‘democracy’. It seems to me that you naively still believe the people have control in our so-called democratic system. Anyway, last post on this; I’m genuinely surprised that so many people on here have yet to put two and two together. But my guess is those people are still paying their BBC license and still think their vote is meaningful i.e. being ‘good citizens’ within the system that has enslaved them.
We don’t have capitalism, we have cronyism. Post office, lockdown, bank bailouts, QE. Add communist healthcare, socialist education, pensions, money, you name it….
And you’re saying it’s the fault of the private sector? Back of the class.
Yes, of course. It’s the people at the post office and the NHS that are ploughing billions into funding far-left changes that are collapsing society as we know it. Jesus, some people.
It’s the people at the Post Office who work in a state-backed monopoly quango. It’s the people at the NHS who work in an intrinsically communist organisation “free at the point of delivery” etc. It’s the government that allows these states of affairs to continue.
Back to your original point. If you want to talk about challenges in our education industry, including but not limited to “privilege”, how about examining the role of the 93.5% state-backed state-funded state-controlled price-capped “free at the-point of delivery” monopolist? And while you’re about it, checking out the “privilege” of, for example, prominent abolitionist and grammar school user Francis Green?
If you’d like to understand this subject, I strongly recommend The Beautiful Tree by James Tooley.
Well if you are going to have News on it should really be GB News, unless you want brainwashed by BBC and SKY stuffing the manufactured climate crisis down your throat. Plus you also get the gorgeous Bev Turner
It would also be good if GB News ran other shows like the one the author mentioned in his introduction. Shows about music, art, nature, gardens etc with no presenters screaming about the climate emergency or the ‘evil’ Mr Trump.
It’s a News Channel and opinion programme about current affairs and politics, the economy etc. ——There are plenty of other places to watch music art and gardening. After all you would not watch a Music Channel and expect them to include articles about illegal immigration or Net Zero would you?
It is nothing to do with tax raising and all about class warfare and control. They want to teach all childfren about gender choiuce, left wing policies and white oppression but they cannot be sure these messages are getting through in private schools.
The very well off won’t have to worry. They can pay the VAT if their childrens’ schools remain opoen or they can send them overseas.
Thanks, quite agree
There are lots and lots of independent schools, yet people generally just think of the big ones like Eton. Virtually all of them have bursary schemes to provide places for children of parents who cannot afford the fees. If revenue is reduced by people not sending their children to these schools as a result of the VAT addition to the the fees, one of the first things to go will be bursaries and thus the first people to be affected will be the children of poorer parents.
True. If you really want your children to go to private school, you can almost certainly get a bursary. The people in the middle are the worst off, if you earn £50k it sounds a lot but isn’t after tax, but there is no way you can afford school fees, and it probably won’t entitle you to a bursary. If you get some sort of benefit or are on low income chances are you will get the fees paid assuming your child will be a good fit in the school.
Someone I know apparently emailed Keir Starmer and each member of the entire Labour front bench education team and asked this question 5 days ago and has had no answer.
Please try this yourselves:
“What please is Labour’s policy on independent schools”?
It seems Labour does not have one.
The writer could not find the policy online so decided to ask.
That also included one of the Labour Party regional offices also.
If it is the case that there is no policy, why not? And what are they doing trying to levy a potentially catastrophic 20% tax on parents of children in those schools? It cannot fit a policy because there does not appear to be one.
Independent schools are part of the UK’s education infrastucture.
6% of pupils attend independent schools.
Who in their right minds would mindlessly embark on this potentially catastrophic VAT crusade without knowing what the policy is to independent schools?
This is like ULEZ for parents of children in independent schools. But this cannot be to raise money as it has already been shown in prior comments that the supposed £1.6Bn saving will be eaten up in the extra costs resulting from pupils entering the state sector and from schools closing.
Labour’s Education Front Bench
You can look up the email addresses on the Parliament website:
Bridget Phillipson – Shadow Secretary of State for Education
Catherine McKinnell – Shadow Minister for Schools
Matthew Western – Shadow Minister for Higher Education
Seema Malhotra – Shadow Minister for Skills
Helen Hayes – Shadow Minister for Children and Early Years
Baroness (Debbie) Wilcox – Shadow Spokesperson
Baroness (Fiona) Twycross – Shadow Spokesperson
It would be nice to think that an influx of “better” children into state schools might drag their standards up a little bit, but wising up is sadly not the opposite of dumbing down.
Thanks, I agree with you and I reject the proposition entirely.
One one hand you have high-performing grammar schools, academies, 6th form colleges and some “posh comps”. These have comparable Russell Group entry to good independent schools. There are plenty of “better children” at these schools; adding more does not help the school, it does exacerbate an oversubscription issue and some children will be displaced.
At the other extreme are schools struggling to cope with significant behavioural and social problems. I struggle to see (and nobody sees fit to explain) how putting “better” children into those environments helps. At worst, if you put a good apple in a bad barrel, you just get another bad apple.
Those observations aside, I reject the principle. My children, and yours, by-and-large have nice manners, respect and self-discipline, not because we are billionaires but because (I simplify) we read to them and took them for walks as toddlers rather than parking them in front of the telly with a fistful of sweets. I don’t agree with anyone saying it’s my kids’ responsibility to drag up the standards of the rest. There are much deeper problems of social breakdown at stake and government’s fingerprints are all over it.
The motive is clear : create more demand for state sector places. This protects government jobs and keeps the unions happy. Same playbook. Different decade.
Class Warfare as usual. —–The fuel of leftist politics