FreeSpirit - Time for a fairer society

Pacifist and Pro-European, believes in democracy - simply wanting a fairer, kinder society for all. All opinions expressed here are my own.

[BladeoftheSun @BladeoftheS]

Right now British Jets are flying constant patrols to protect Israel and shoot down any drones from Iran.

This is costing you hundreds of millions, to aid a country committing War Crimes.

If you don't want this and it needs to end, RT.

[Guy Verhofstadt @guyverhofstadt]

A historic, shameful moment in US history as it votes with Belarus, Russia at the UN.

The gamekeeper has become the poacher.

Churchill & Roosevelt turn in their graves.

[Roman Sheremeta 🇺🇸🇺🇦 @rshereme]

This brilliant cartoon clearly explains Trump’s current position on Ukraine. It is in Ukrainian with English subtitles. Share it with anyone who keeps repeating russian propaganda.

[Rob Moore @robprogressive]

After my daughter’s school announced it is shutting down, I got a huge backlash
Millions of views.

Lots of hate. Many national media requests

And so much lack of understanding for what’s really going on

Completely out of the blue. 100s of distraught kids.  

Why?

Labour’s tax hikes on school fees: 

-VAT added at 20% high-quality
-National insurance raised on staff 
-Business rates added to schools 

A nurturing school forced to close because of greedy, arrogant taxation & politics of envy

Disgusting.

And to everyone who had no sympathy, all this does is pile more pressure on overcrowded state schools, which hurts the people who hate the rich 

How can ANYONE justify taxing education.

Labour are destroying the very foundations of our children’s future. 

And I have it on good authority that Labour were warned many times that taxing schools would badly backfire & they arrogantly ignored it 

What an absolute disgrace

[ENT - Education Not Taxation @EducationNotTax]

1/ 🚨 The January launch of #SchoolFeeVAT is almost upon us. Implementing this rushed policy Mid school year is no accident—it’s pure #CynicalPolitics by @UKLabour who knows this policy is a disaster, so they’ve timed it to exploit parents' natural instinct to shield their kids.
Let’s break down Why January. 🧵👇

[Charles Thyme @CharlesHThyme]

-Boarding school pupils to be taxed more than luxury hotel guests with the usual VAT reduction for stays longer than 28 days being denied students.

So, apparently exemptions to normal VAT rules are fine as long it hurts students.

https://t.co/lGv64VbNGu

[Lea Cat @NoVATonschools]

The deluded and incompetent @bphillipsonMP thought that schools and parents had a magic money tree, that they could use to pay her education tax.

She thought this because she has never had a businesses or a proper job and the only way @UKLabour knows how to get money is via tax

[Ana Boulter @anaboultertv]

Come on @bphillipsonMP answers on a tweet. Where does George fit in your educational flow chart? He’s got children in private because state failed them and he was a child on FSM. Don’t tell me he doesn’t and one size doesn’t fit all?!?! Because you’ve nicked a generations education based on your flow chart. Heaven forfend it doesn’t actually work?!?! @EducationNotTax @thetimes @Telegraph @georgermccrea

[Hassan Mamdani @HassanMamdani]

Nice summary of why VAT on school fees is yet another ideologically driven policy based on the usual politics of envy that epitomises the Labour Party.

[Olly @oIIyjm]

Whether you are for or against @UKLabour's education tax, there is no reasonable justification for its mid-year introduction. It is utterly cruel.

https://t.co/p21eEbV1dw

[Ed O'Brien @EdOBrien]

This paper, produced in response to the government’s consultation on taxing independent education, is very good. Ministers would have been wise to have followed the advice contained in it to prevent negligence and future political embarrassment. (Full paper linked below).

[Bella Wallersteiner 🇺🇦 @BellaWallerstei]

In Germany, if you send your children to private school, you can claim 30% of the tuition fees, capped at €5,000 per annum, per child as a tax deduction. Meanwhile Britain has become a country which punishes families for going private.

[Tom Morrison MP @ThomasMorrison]

And how is making private schools even more expensive going to open up opportunity? Private schools will always exist, whether we like it or not, the key is to make them more accessible not more exclusive.

[Adam Smith Institute @ASI]

In September, we published our submission to the Govt's consultation on VAT on school fees

@maxwell_marlow raised concerns about the potential rise in demand for state school places and the closure of smaller private schools

You can read it here 👇

https://t.co/QiZSlPKdvN

[Caroline Farrow @CF_Farrow]

She said, in her experience, parents of children with special educational needs will put "anything on the line, their homes, their jobs".

And now the Labour government are slapping an extra 20% tax on people trying to help their SEND kids.

[Katie @katie74RT]

Starmer’s VAT raid will ensure private schools become even more elitist https://t.co/WXaiMXKNrJ
“While the policy is being framed as a move toward equality, its actual impact will be the obverse.”
@EducationNotTax
@DrNShastriHurst
@dshensmith
@CreEnglish
@aliciakearns

[Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst MP @DrNShastriHurst]

Rather than creating greater opportunities, Labour’s decision to impose VAT on private school fees will achieve the opposite. It will be the smaller schools that close, making the system more elitist & widening the societal gap. https://t.co/UCgxMw2Rg0

[FreeSpirit - Time for a fairer society @freespirit3478]

@richardhyland Very good post and explains the real predicament many of our children are in. Most of us using private school are not super affluent parents. We are just trying to get support for our children with SEN that cannot be catered for in the state sector (as the state system is broken)

[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

[Matt Goodwin @GoodwinMJ]

Britain’s hapless Bridget Phillipson is on her way to becoming the worst education secretary this country has ever seen.

Here’s what she’s done in only five months:

-Dumped free speech protections for universities

-Paused funding for successful free schools

-Advocated flexible “working from home” for teachers (true idiocy)

-Watered down academic attainment as a core metric

-Put curriculum review in hands of a Diversity-obsessed woke Professor

-Scrapped funding for Latin

-Refused to speak positively about high-performing Michaela school

-Further eroding high standards by imposing tax hikes on private schools

What do you see in all this?

A Labour education secretary doing the very opposite of what everybody in education should be doing

Instead of putting evidence ahead of ideological dogma she is putting ideological dogma ahead of evidence

Instead of raising standards, aspiration and expectations she is actively lowering them

And it’s the most important people of all who will suffer: our children.