This government doesn’t know the cost or value of anything

The disaster of this government’s education policies is beginning to be realised – but far worse is to come.

We now know – thanks to The Times – that 13,000 children have deserted private sector schools in 2024-2025 – way more than the 3,000 anticipated by the government.

The list of schools closing grows longer each month as the government forces them out of business.

More and more parents cannot afford private education, the cost of which has been hiked following the government’s decision to tax education and impose VAT on school fees.

We are the only country in Europe to tax education.

Greece tried it but it led to schools closing and teachers being laid off – and the policy was quickly reversed.

Around the world only New Zealand taxes education but it offers grants to mitigate the extra cost.

The result of taxing education is thousands of children looking for places in state schools. And state schools will struggle to accommodate them because they are shedding staff.

And the reason they are shedding staff is that the government gave teachers a pay rise without increasing budgets to finance them properly.

It means pay rises and funding for new places often come from the same squeezed pots.

And as the few remaining maths teachers will tell you, those figures don’t add up.

Labour’s bold promise to recruit 6,500 more teachers has also fallen on its face.

The targets for secondary school teachers have fallen short by around 40 per cent.

So not only will this policy raise nothing like the £1.7bn a year the government claimed it would from 2027 – a tiny amount anyway in the great scheme of things – but it will lead to children’s education suffering.

So why did they do it?

Ideology – pure and simple. The politics of envy.

Ironically, it is making private education more exclusive because only the really rich can now afford to educate their children privately.

And let’s remember, parents who send their children into the private system are paying twice.

They are paying for a place in the state system through their taxes but are not taking it up and this frees up capacity.

Now, increasing numbers of parents want that place and the government must pay for it.

And over the years tens of thousands of children who would previously have gone to private school will be educated in the state sector. It is a timebomb.

Every state school place costs around £7,000 per year so with tens of thousands of children added to the state education sector the money required will rocket.

And let’s not forget that as people leave the private system, they are no longer paying the 20 per cent VAT on the fees.

So Labour is producing the perfect storm; forcing children out of the private sector into a state sector in which many schools are shedding staff because of the pay rises; collecting far less tax than anticipated and putting more pressure on already-beleaguered teachers.

This looming disaster is one thing, but we also know that the Education Secretary is keen on progressive educational techniques. Yes, the same ones that have been proven to fail over and over again…

 

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