Sarah V

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@UWCL Lisbon Passport Control - over 3 hours wait time

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@UWCL I wouldn’t recommend Lisbon being the hosts again. Loads of supporters stuck in a 3 hour passport control queue.

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@visitportugal Love Portugal but will be telling people not to come until they sort out Passport Control. Over 3 hours in the queue at Lisbon is a joke.

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@BBC Passport control at Lisbon airport

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@AirportLisbon Do not fly in to Lisbon if you can help it. Horrendous passport queues!

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@WeAreOpenreach We have been without internet for 10 days even after two Openreach engineer visits. Escalation takes far too long. Poor.

[Richard Hyland @richardhyland]

The VAT on private school fees seems to be a very divisive one, and mostly focused by Labour supporters on private school parents being able to suck up a 20% increase

Well here’s my take on the lesser talked about issues, and it’s about the wider scale of the problem

1. If more than the number of planned kids move to state sector, it’s a net loss policy, so far the figures look like they are way out. We will see with time, with next September being the largest likely time (conveniently monitoring stops then)

2. If too many kids leave, the private school closes and now all those kids have to be placed

3. Local authorities are obligated to find a place. There may be places in parts of the country but they don’t necessarily geographically align with the private schools. For instance, Surrey, which has quite a few private schools has announced its run out of places

4. Schools that also operate as charities were legally obligated to give back, and so offered burseries, offered free rental of facilities, that’ll stop

5. Serivces like, private swimming clubs, etc will now have to pass on VAT, as the school has to, to the swimming club, and then to the end customer

6. The argument is often framed as schools should pay their tax as other businesses have to, except for two things, nurseries and universities are also businesses and are still VAT exempt. Secondly VAT is not paid by the school at all, it’s paid by the end consumer, the parents

7. If as reported, many private schools close down as a result of that, it’s not long about 5-8% of pupils moving from private to state sector, it’s now 100% of pupils moving from private to state sector. No council can cope with that

8. Schools can immediately reclaim tax up to 10 years of capital projects such as buildings and land acquisition

Now onto what happens when places have run out in councils. One of these three things will happen, because local authorities are obligated to find a place for children:

A. They will try to find places further afield, for which taxis will be provided each way for those kids and funded by the local tax payer

B. They will pay to send them back to the very same private school they came from, but now the tax payer will pick up the entire cost of the school fees, not just the VAT

C. The will overfill the school, which will put a strain on the education of the kids already in that school, or more teachers are hired and class rooms built, which is also a big drain on the taxpayer

D. EHCP kids resources are already likely to cause some councils to go bankrupt this year, as reported recently, and that’s without all the additional numbers of children moving back from private schools to the state sector

Now lastly, and most importantly, that very few of the supporters of this policy seem to discus, the effect on the kids themselves and their education and friends:

1. Choosing to bring this in mid year is incredibly damaging to their education, especially those in examination years as they may not be able to register for GCSEs and A-levels and their new schools and the new schools won’t accept the enrolment on the old examining board. It is a fact that education is harmed more by moving mid-year than between school years

2. Kids will leave their friends behind which can damage social and emotional development

3. If there’s no schools close by they’ll be spending hours a day travelling to and from school, affecting their family life

I’d love there to be a system where private schools were no longer necessary, but we do that by levelling up the state sector, not levelling down the private sector

The biggest factor to why people choose private education is because of the far better pupil to teacher ratio, and that’s a huge task to achieve, and huge amount of money, in the state sector

Personal disclaimer: I was privately educated until 16, after which I went to a Grammar school until 18 and my own children are in state education

[The Times and Sunday Times @thetimes]

Contingency plans are being drawn up in Whitehall for an influx in demand for state school places amid fears private schools will go bankrupt and close because of fee increases https://t.co/s1IAbQtQ4a

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@Merton_Council Can Garth Road Recycling
be updated when it has to close unexpectedly?
Or at least notify those with bookings to avoid everyone making pointless trips.

[ENT - Education Not Taxation @EducationNotTax]

Weasel words. Every. Single. Time. 😡
What we are absolutely clear on is this: you cannot improve state schools nor support the aspirations of all parents and children with #SchoolFeeVAT, which will harm ALL:
📚 More pupils in crowded classrooms risks worsening outcomes.
⚠️ An overloaded SEN system can't support vulnerable kids properly.
🏘️ Economic harm: Independent schools support local jobs & services—closures hurt communities.
❓Punitive taxes: Fairness matters—don’t punish choice or divide education further.
#FindABetterWay #EducationNotTax @Keir_Starmer @bphillipsonMP @KemiBadenoch @Nigel_Farage

[ENT - Education Not Taxation @EducationNotTax]

Certainly up there with the best for hypocrisy... @LouHaigh benefited from an independent education at @SheffieldHigh but now votes to deny that choice to her constituents and to do harm too the local economy. Sheffield High, do invite Lou back to explain why @UKLabour is punishing parents with extra taxes for choosing the same for their children. #SchoolFeeVAT #EducationNotTax

[James Denison @jrkdenison]

That thing that they said wouldn't happen is happening.

I often seeing two arguments raised in relation to this issue:

1. Why don't the schools just absorb the tax or increase class sizes?

2. The state sector has hundreds of thousands of spare places.

Absorption of VAT

Many schools simply don't have the resources available to mitigate the impact of VAT, not to mention the increased Business Rates and ENIC liabilities.

The vast majority of school expenditure reflects staff costs anyway, so those arguing for spending cuts and/or larger classes (with the same number of pupils, of course) are really arguing for redundancies, which is just a different kind of unfair disruption, and lower Income Tax and NI receipts.

Spare Capacity

Availability is only meaningful if it's suitable and accessible. A spare Year 10 place is no use to a Year 5 pupil. A spare mainstream place is no use to a pupil with particular SEND requirements. A spare place in Newcastle is no use to a pupil in Leeds.

Spare capacity is also cold comfort to pupils who have spent the last five or 17 months studying for their GCSEs or A-Levels based on different subject matter and/or the criteria of different exam boards.

Besides, if you believe @bphillipsonMP, the whole point of the #EducationTax is to raise money for the state sector. If the state system has such enormous space capacity, why does it need more funding?

In any event, all of this is peripheral to the key point that education is a merit good and we should never tax anything that the state has to provide if people can't pay for it themselves.

[Anthony Boutall @anthonyboutall]

As a teacher in a state school, I am 100% opposed to this Labour govt’s hated education tax. It is intentionally chaotic, being introduced for January in the middle of the academic year, & it will lead to:

- Overcrowded state schools
- Disarray & disruption for SEN children
- Less scope for bursaries for the least well off
- Negligible tax revenue, if not an actual net cost to taxpayers
- State schools forced to cope with a sudden surge & overcrowded classrooms
- Children from lower-income families less likely to gain places at sought after local state schools

Well done to everyone who campaigned to force a u-turn for military families, exempting them from this pernicious tax.

Assuming this govt is too proud to accept the whole policy should be scrapped (which, in an ideal world, it should), it is now imperative that we campaign to get the same exemption for SEN children. It is disgraceful that they should be facing this immediate disruption, forced on them by the govt.

https://t.co/1l3107JQ0L

[Olly @oIIyjm]

The @FCDOGovUK has written to private schools asking if they will offer diplomats a discount, as many cannot afford Labour's education tax.

That means one government department is asking for help to mitigate the damage caused by another.

Shambolic.

https://t.co/HIHXUwVHOt

[Triumph @dp4bw]

If moving a child during GCSEs is recognised openly by councils as a bad idea (and it is consistently stated as such because it is indeed a bad idea) then really the government should have ensure their implementation avoided forcing people into a position with no policy to assist

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@AllyCister @EducationNotTax @KirstieMAllsopp Yes but income should be taxed not education. VAT on school fees is a policy of envy that is going to result in a loss given the amount of children that will need to stay or move into the already struggling state sector.

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@AllyCister @EducationNotTax @KirstieMAllsopp Exactly the same as independent school parents who don’t use state schools! Double taxation

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@AllyCister @EducationNotTax @KirstieMAllsopp Maybe the parents of the 2 million state school children who earn the same as the parents of independent school children should also contribute towards the state education they are getting for free?

[Sarah V @SarahEVowles]

@easyJet what is the point of having a scheduled take off time when you always leave an hour late and blame “air traffic”. Plane is ready, everyone boarded before take off time. It’s not happening to BA flights
leaving at the same time.

[ENT - Education Not Taxation @EducationNotTax]

@bmay This policy affects all children. Fewer students in independent schools mean crowded state classrooms. It harms jobs, local economies. Reduces parental choice and strains SEN resources. And please remember, these are children, not just statistics. #EducationNotTax