Holy Smoke: Losing faith - will Labour’s VAT policy hit religious schools hardest?

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🗓️ 8 September 2024

⏱️ 25 minutes

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Summary

In this week’s copy of The Spectator, Dan Hitchens argues that a lesser reported aspect of Labour’s decision to impose VAT on private schools is who it could hit hardest: faith schools. Hundreds of independent religious schools charge modest, means-tested fees. Could a hike in costs make these schools unviable? And, with uncertainty about how ideological a decision this is, does the government even care? Dan joins Damian on the podcast to discuss.

Raisel Freedman from the Partnerships for Jewish Schools also joins later, to discuss how the measure could threaten Jewish independent schools, when they provide a haven for students from a climate of rising antisemitism.

Produced by Patrick Gibbons.

Transcript

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0:00.0	The Spectator magazine is home to wonderful writing, insightful analysis, and unrivaled books and arts reviews.
0:06.1	Subscribe today for just £12 and receive a 12-week subscription in print and online.
0:11.2	Alongside that, you get a 20-pound John Lewis or Waitrose Voucher.
0:14.7	Go to spectator.com.uk forward slash voucher.
0:34.9	Welcome to Holy Smoke, the Spectator's Religion podcast. I'm Damien Thompson.
0:40.8	In the new issue of the Spectator School supplement, journalist Dan Hitchens has drawn attention to the people most likely, in fact certain, to suffer from
0:48.9	labour's imposition of VAT and business rates on independent schools. That is, small independent faith schools,
0:57.7	many of them not hugely profitable, run for Christian, Jewish and Muslim families with modest
1:05.0	incomes. Those schools will pass on the costs to parents. And Dan, as you explain in your article, these schools
1:14.4	that don't have vast charitable endowments to draw on are very worried by what's going to happen.
1:21.2	Could you just take me through it?
1:22.9	Yeah, I think it's a great example of a policy and a policy debate, which is very detached from
1:30.0	the reality on the ground. Everything in the papers and when it comes up on question time or
1:36.1	whatever is about very wealthy schools who are going to have to raise their fees a bit. So
1:41.5	Eaton are going to raise their fees from 51,000 a year to
1:45.0	63,000 a year. My piece is about the many schools right at the other end of the spectrum.
1:53.9	So I spoke to the head of Emmanuel Christian School in Leicester, which rents the local church hall and has a couple of porter cabins out
2:03.1	the back. The average fees, which are mean tested, are $220 pounds a month, and it has 54 pupils.
2:12.1	It's an absolutely tiny place. You know, the teachers there and the parents and everyone involved
2:17.4	is very idealistic.
2:19.2	Head teacher himself took a pay cut from working the state sector to work at this school.
2:24.1	This is a very threadbare institution, you know, no money to spend on facilities or resources or
	...

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