2024 UK politics - now with Labour in charge
Comments
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Apologies, missed your allusion when I made my JC (Jaffa Cake, not John Cleese or Jesus Christ) comment.
No doubt you are aware of the philosophical problem of hard definitions, hence the famous JC court case. So yes, I'd agree that simplifying categories/ironing out anomalies would be desirable, though that doesn't preclude differential VAT rates. Whether special specific exceptions have any positive effect for consumers is another argument entirely.
Perhaps if @surrey_commuter were still in this parish, he might argue that VAT is applied to everything, but at a much lower rate - it would be possible outside of the EU. Though the downside to that is that it would be a highly regressive tax, as the proportion of food VAT versus income would be much higher for poorer people.
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Do you want to pay standard rate on your domestic heating fuel?
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We're in danger of confusing passion with incompetence
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You were the one that suggested that state schools having good results was just a question of wealthy parents. That doesn't actually seem to be the case. I'm not sure either of our personal experiences 30 years ago or more are relevant.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Good grief. Are you actually arguing that there's no correlation?
Both universities have had to increase the percentage of state school students. How they have done so is less clear. Nonetheless, 2/3 of Oxford students are now from state schools, up from about 50 in my time.
This means you are around 7 times more likely to get in from a fee paying school. For your argument to hold, you have to presume that fee paying schools don't select for wealthier parents. Which, respectfully, is daft.
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I'm suggesting that the £ per pupil is not what makes the difference. You seem to agree that in your own case that was mainly down to your college not having a grasp of the differing adnissions procedure. There was not an expectation that they should be pointing the top 2% of students towards Oxbridge. The Brampton Manor example is an outlier and I'd question for whose benefit that but it shows what can be done without fees or wealthy, sharp-elbowed parents. I'm suggesting that fee paying schools are charging for that expectation and knowledge of how to play the admissions game (and the nice facilities) rather than some fundamental difference in teaching.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Are state schools helping with STEP paper prep now?
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I don't think I said that, but I did say resource. If you have one school putting more resource into something, there will be better outcomes.
This is self perpetuating, in that schools with good performance effectively become selective.
Hats off to that one example, but it isnt particularly representative across the state sector as the overall stats show. Instead, there is a strong correlation overall between wealth, health and educational attainment.
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pain in the neck, even worse for dual-use stuff
eu used to be easy/fast, but brexit put a stop to that
my bike - faster than god's and twice as shiny0 -
As you say, I'm not sure a handful of inner city schools that have possibly worked out how best to play the Oxbridge game (and possibly the getting extra per pupil funding game) means that private schools are no better (on average) than state.
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This is from one of my local comprehensives.
Students applying to universities with an early application deadline will work with specialist staff led by the Head of Year 13 in an 'Early Application' Mentor Group to ensure they are fully prepared for their application.
Through this group students will have access to the following support:
- 1:1 support with personal statements and interview preparation
- Workshops delivered by experienced external speakers
- Access to the cross-trust Oxbridge programme, bringing together students from across the three trust schools in subject specific groups to discuss and debate academic ideas and material.
- One-to-one mock interviews and personalised feedback a few weeks prior to the interview at Oxford or Cambridge.
- Numerous ‘drop-in’ opportunities with the Head of Year 13 and Year 13 Oxbridge and Russell Group mentor.
Doesn't mention STEP specifically, but seems likely that it would be included.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
You can always find exceptions if you look hard enough.
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
No, that looks like all the warm cuddly stuff that was around in my day. Help with STEP papers would involve the relevant teacher spending loads of extra time teaching the stuff required.
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I saw that and that's not what I said in that post. So you'll have to explain what you're on about.
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
Sounds like you've run out of arguments.
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
That isn't an accidental exception though, is it? If it follows that VAT should be the same on all forms of education then logically you also want to take it back to standard rate for domestic fuel.
Would be a bold move, one that hits those with mansions hardest, as well as old people who like to live in a sauna.
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We're agreed that parents 'busting a gut' to afford school fees is irrelevant. Thanks
“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!0 -
You sound like you asked a question, didn't get the answer you wanted but are digging in anyway.
Sad
“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!0 -
Not often you see a straw man so completely demolished.
VAT is consistent only in its inconsistency.
Time to move on
“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!0 -
Can you explain your thinking here. I'm not trying to be argumentative. There is VAT on fuel which is reduced in some circumstances. To align it with VAT on private schools discussion, there would need to be VAT on education except in some circumstances (e.g. French classes on Weds, university fees). If it was done this way, then there would be VAT on MBAs and other stuff too.
I'm not convinced that there being an exemption from VAT for something implies discriminatory VAT for something else is ok.
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All fuel was zero rated until 1990, when it was introduced only on non-domestic supply. That sounds pretty similar.
The plan was to then bring domestic fuel in line (at standard rate), but it didn't get done, and stopped at a reduced rate, which was then reduced to 5% when Brown became chancellor.
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Ok, so as I said, make all education VATable except ... then I can see the comparison.
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I've not looked further as it's not relevant for my two. Unless I'm mistaken STEP is only relevant to people studying Maths at Oxbridge, so that will always be a very small number of students in any one school. Academy groups are obviously better placed to pool the resources needed to provide that additional assistance.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Why would they do that when they want to impose VAT on private schools? It would seem like an overcomplicated way of doing it rather than just making this exclusion from the exemption.
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I assumed the logic that means private schools are VATable would apply to most education with some exceptions (e.g. state funded university). For example, I would assume an MBA would be VATable. As I said before, I don't have a chip on my shoulder about private schools, but I would have thought anyone who did would also be chipped about MBAs. It's pretty discriminatory to only target providers of education to children during school terms (or whatever definition they end up going with).
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I think it was in this thread we were discussing it:
@TheBigBean , on the subject of nuclear regulation. From the Office for Nuclear Regulation, an explanation of how they apply the ALARA principle to safety measures.
So the cost of a safety measure may be up to 10 times the benefit in improved safety. This is part of the reason we haven't built nuclear power stations so much.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
They have done it in a hurry because it was a bugbear of some people they wanted to please and they wanted it without the delay of lengthy consultation. Your way would have more consistency and internal logic, but also have big risks of affecting people/businesses they didn't really think of.
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I love the way everyone thinks VAT application is carefully considered and logical.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Yes, I agree which is why I think your heating point isn't really relevant.
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Relevant in that if you think everything should be treated in a consistent way, you should be consistent about it.
I still think the 1990 change is very similar but on a larger scale.
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