Class war on private schools ‘to cost YOU £25million’
SCOTLAND’s private schools have launched a broadside against an SNP tax assault they claim will cost the public purse five times more than it raises.
Independent schools are also being used to ‘distract’ from the Scottish Government’s ‘failings in state education’, according to one leading principal.
A Bill will be launched this month that will strip private schools of their charitable status – meaning they must pay full business rates.
The move is expected to raise some £5 million a year for councils.
But an independent report has warned the stripping of rates relief could end up costing taxpayers up
‘The SNP’s sums do not add up correctly’
to £25 million, because school fee rises to fund the change will force some parents to move their children into state schools.
John Edward, of the Scottish Council of Independent Schools (SCIS), said: ‘There is a worrying misconception that independent schools are made of money.
‘Schools are independent because they are autonomous, not because they are run for profit.
‘They must be run as not-forprofit bodies, so new financial demands can only come from parental fee income, the physical assets of the schools, the workforce, or the substantial sums allocated to widening participation. Every child lost to the sector is a cost to the taxpayer with a new state school place. As every maths student knows, the sums do not add up correctly.’
SCIS warns the £5 million brought in by the SNP’s plan would be wiped out if only 3 per cent of pupils have to move into state schools.
A report by independent consultants BiGGAR Economics predicts fees will go up 7 per cent, making them unaffordable for the parents of 15 per cent of pupils.
The rise was attributed to business rates and pension cost hikes.
The analysis by BiGGAR – which worked on the SNP’s Sustainable Growth Commission – focused on Edinburgh, which is home to the bulk of the country’s private schools, but the effects are expected to be the same across Scotland.
The report predicts the cost to the taxpayer will be £25 million – five times as much as the amount brought in by the rates change. Private schools add £150 million to the economy and support 3,000 jobs.
Melvyn Roffe, principal at George Watson’s College in the capital, questions whether the SNP is using its class war on private schools to ‘distract from its obvious policy failings in state education’.
Writing in today’s Scottish Mail on Sunday, he says: ‘Yes, we benefit from 80 per cent non-domestic rate relief, which saves my school some £400,000 a year. But set against that the £14 million my school annually saves the Scottish Government by relieving it of the cost of educating 2,400 children, and it looks like a good deal for the Government.’
Tory education spokesman Liz Smith said: ‘The SNP will simply place an increasing burden on the struggling state sector.’
The Scottish Government said: ‘We accepted the independent Barclay Review recommendation that reduced or zero-rate bills relief for independent schools, while councilrun schools pay rates, was unfair.
‘We have engaged with the independent school sector as we finalise the detail of our proposals ahead of the introduction of the Non Domestic Rates (Scotland) Bill.’