On Monday my buddy Tony Perry launched our parents’ campaign in support of good schools. First I want to thank him for his hard work and moral courage; I’m not sure in his NHS capacity he has many obvious workplace allies for his cause.
Please take the time to sign Tony’s petition if you haven’t already. Also, your children, neighbours and grandchildren. And the version of yourself that has a work email address. Approaching 75k signatures…
A brief intro to the campaign
Who we are. We are working families who strongly value education and put our kids first.
Most of us aren’t the Range-Rover + second home stereotypes; most of us don’t have much to spare out of disposable income minus school fees
That’s how we know that large numbers of families will be considering moving to state schools if they face a VAT-driven fee increase
Aside from the obvious importance to us, we care enormously about the public finances and about state schools - which are used by our neighbours, friends and colleagues
What we believe
We shouldn’t be punished for doing what parents are supposed to do…the best we can for our children
When we choose independent school we pay a shedload of tax and save the Government a shedload of money on the
freetaxpayer-funded place we don’t use. We’re helping society, not hurting itThe fiscal case for the policy is half-baked, relying heavily on the not-very-good IFS review that I’ve covered here
The policy will not help, and will significantly harm, the public finances and state schools, while imposing a significant human cost by disrupting children’s education (again)
What we want to do
We want to provide thought leadership on the topic
to encourage supporters of school quality and parental choice to explain why this is bad not just for us (obviously) but for the public finances and for state schools
to persuade policymakers that while many of us are higher-earning families, by the time we’ve paid tax, school fees and core expenditure there’s not (for most of us) that much to spare for another £7k in VAT (20% of average £17k fees for two children)…
…so if we stop being willing and able to choose the combination of work, tax, labour output and “saving the taxman a shedload of money” it’s really bad for everyone else
We want to ask parents, families staff and employees (at all levels) of private schools, and other supporters of choice and quality in education, to come forward and explain, via any channels we can think of, what the impact of this policy will be on them and others.
What you can do
Be informed and follow us
Join the FB group “Education not Taxation”
Tell your mates
Write to your MP
Share your stories
Good campaign coverage
Here’s the Telegraph coverage
Sir Keir Starmer knows if he is to placate Left-wing misgivings over the party’s abandonment of other socialist nostrums, he must provide some red meat. This takes the form of yet another Labour attack on educational excellence to follow up its near destruction of the grammar schools.
As we report today, a campaign is under way spearheaded by parents anxious to puncture the myth that these schools are the preserve of the super-wealthy. More than 50,000 people have signed a petition urging Labour to drop the policy.
And of course there was some less-favourable coverage from the usual suspects