Labour’s plan to slap VAT on school fees is a tax on aspiration. I know because my mum worked three jobs to pay for my education

YOU don’t have to be a Leftwing firebrand to feel a twinge of unease as you stroll past the gates of Eton College in Windsor, where annual fees total £50,000.

The sight of boys in starched collars, black tailcoats, waistcoats and pinstriped trousers seems almost calculated to bring out one’s inner class warrior.

Of course, no one is more susceptible to this urge than the members of the modern Labour Party, which appears determined to stamp out elitism wherever it rears its head. Why, they ask, should an institution such as Eton be exempt from VAT, ensuring that these wealthy parents pay less?

But the idea that private schools are solely the preserve of the rich is a colossal misconception — as I know from my own experience.

Sacrifices

Thousands of hard-working parents, often struggling to make ends meet, make enormous sacrifices to send their children to private schools in the hope of improving their prospects.

During a recent TV Q&A with Rishi Sunak, the assistant headteacher of a private school in Teesside pointed out that ‘many of our families … make lifestyle compromises to be able to invest in their children’s education’.

The PM replied: ‘The people you’re talking about are people like my parents. My parents came here without a huge amount … but they worked really hard to give their kids a better life. They thought education was the best way to do that.’

This is my family’s story, too. My parents settled in Britain after leaving Nigeria in the early 1990s. They were both from well- to- do Nigerian families and had attended private boarding schools in Britain as well as Nigeria.

But, as is the case with many new immigrants from former British colonies, their success in their country of origin did not translate into material wealth in their new home.

A combination of an economic crisis in Nigeria, family breakdown and visa issues meant they faced many challenges. It didn’t help that my parents had a tumultuous relationship and my father wasn’t always present. Even when he was, he contributed very little to family finances.

During my childhood, my mother, Bola — who studied chemistry at university — struggled to build a stable, long-term career as she did not have the right to permanent residency in Britain.

As a result, she changed jobs frequently and was forced to take on positions for which she was vastly over-qualified. Nor could she rely on financial support from relatives, as most of them were either in a similar situation here or in Nigeria.

But my mum never gave up and resolved to do everything she could to provide a better life for my sister and me. She believed in hard work, personal responsibility and selfdiscipline — values strong in many immigrant communities and values you’d think the Labour Party would endorse.

Mum had always wanted to send us to private school because she felt it was the best chance of giving us a great education like the one she’d had: top facilities, small class sizes, well- behaved children and plenty of extracurricular activities.

She had loved boarding school and felt that it gave pupils a sense of independence and self- confidence, an experience she wanted to give her own children.

So she worked multiple jobs, including night shifts in the care sector, to send her daughters to independent primary schools in Kent, where class sizes were small and teachers’ expectations were high.

By the time we got to secondary school age, Mum was determined to send us to boarding school. Her relationship with my father was deteriorating and she wanted us to be in a safe and stable environment. She had begun saving for this from the moment we were born and had dreams of sending us to prestigious establishments such as The King’s School, Canterbury; Christ’s Hospital, Horsham; and Rochester Independent College in Kent.

But in the end, she settled on Hockerill Anglo European College, an international state boarding school in Hertfordshire, after being seduced by the idea of sending us somewhere that offered a multinational and multilingual environment. It may have been a state school, but boarding fees for two girls totalled £30,000 a year back in the 2000s and she could only afford it by the skin of her teeth.

While my sister completed her secondary education at the boarding school, I left after two years due to homesickness, and began attending a local comprehensive that was in such a bad way it went into special measures during my time there.

However, I was lucky enough to complete my sixth form at a state grammar school which had such a good reputation that the majority of the students were the children of upper middle- class parents who had moved into its catchment area to guarantee their children a place at a school that was rated ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted.

Demonised

So, I experienced British schools of all kinds. And this experience across the spectrum left me with an abiding respect for private education, which gives many people from deprived backgrounds a passport to a better life.

It is abundantly clear to me that, if Labour levied 20 per cent VAT on private schools, it would only strip many aspirational, hard-working families of their hopes and dreams for their children.

For many, even a small increase in fees would make their already stretched financial situation untenable. Of course, not all state schools are bad. Many have wonderful teachers and provide outstanding education.

However, too frequently state schooling is a postcode lottery, since too many are not performing as well as they should. Take Derbyshire. Department for Education data shows just 6.7 per cent of the 110,000 children in the county attended schools rated ‘outstanding’ in 2021-22.

State schools that do excel are all too often run by mavericks who are demonised for having high expectations of their students and taking a stern approach to discipline.

The Michaela School in Wembley, North-West London, run by the formidable Katharine Birbalsingh, dubbed ‘Britain’s strictest headteacher’, is a good example of this.

Punitive

The impact of school closures during the Covid-19 pandemic has also had a disastrous impact.

But when it comes to combating the decline in educational standards, I believe that private schools can play a vital role.

While imposing a punitive rate of VAT is not the answer, it is fair to ask private schools to do more in terms of offering scholarships and partnering with state schools.

According to The Good Schools Guide, almost a third of students educated at private schools receive some financial assistance, either in the form of a scholarship or a bursary.

The Guide also reports that the cost of private education has more than doubled in 30 years, even after inflation.

This has had the effect of taking private schools out of the range of many parents and forcing others to take out loans to pay school fees. Is this what Keir Starmer wants?

Labour is sending a chilling message to aspirational parents: don’t try to improve your lot, don’t make sacrifices, don’t work hard and don’t do what you think is best for your children. Only the richest can strive for that.

If Starmer goes ahead with his plan to impose VAT on private schools, they will become the preserve of the offspring of super-wealthy and foreign oligarchs. What price social mobility then?