6 days ago
Labour's next hit to independent schools could be far more insidious
Is Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson about to launch her latest onslaught on independent schools?
Over the last year Labour has already imposed 20pc VAT on school fees and scrapped mandatory business rate relief for schools with charitable status, vindictively treating them differently from all other charities.
Those two measures were unambiguous, public attacks on private education. What might now follow is rather more subtle, but all the more insidious.
Phillipson has announced the Government is considering scrapping Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCP) for children with special educational needs (SEN), and planning to replace them with a less onerous and cheaper system.
This may sound like good news to anyone who rightly thinks that public spending is out of control. Nearly 483,000 children, or 5.3pc of the school population, had an EHCP in the 2024-25 school year, according to government figures – an increase of 11pc on the previous year and a doubling since 2016. The numbers are clearly unsustainable.
But might Phillipson's conversion to sound public finances be motivated by another factor? EHCPs are an essential part of why the state pays, either in whole or in part, for some children to go to independent schools.
Local authorities are obliged to provide schooling to children living within its boundaries. But what if it is unable to provide adequate education to a given child due to their specific needs?
This may be due to the fact that the child would not be able to cope with larger class sizes, or it might be because their dyslexia is at such a level that the local school is not set up to deal with it.
More often than not, the local authority will do all in its power to avoid paying up for the independent school which can provide an adequate education suitable for that child.
In 2024, less than half of EHCPs were issued by local authorities within the 20-week time limit required by law, according to the Department for Education. Many parents have to appeal the initial decision to the national SEN tribunal to try and achieve a satisfactory outcome.
But some parents do eventually succeed in getting their local authority to pay for private provision. This school year there were 7,200 children with an EHCP attending mainstream independent schools, with more than 20,000 at specialist independent schools.
When the Government imposed VAT on school fees the only category that remained exempted were local authorities paying fees for children with an EHCP. If these plans no longer exist, how will it be decided whether a local authority is obliged to pay for private provision? And what mechanism of appeal will there be? Will local authorities continue to pay for the education of children with existing EHCPs?
These are questions that may be worrying many parents this weekend.
It is also of concern to the schools themselves. For the independent mainstream schools, local authority-funded places for children with an EHCP will only be a very modest proportion of their total intake. But for specialist schools it is a different story.
At one school in London, which is a world leader for children with dyslexia, around 60pc of pupils have their school fees paid for by their local authority.
Paying for independent schooling is undoubtedly a heavy burden, but it is not the fault of parents that a local authority is unable to provide an adequate education for their child within its own schools.
A move from Phillipson could turn out to be akin to what Michael Gove did as education secretary, when he increased the required employer contributions for teachers' pensions. Historically, most independent schools have been part of the state's pay-as-you-go, unfunded Teachers' Pension Scheme. In 2012, the employer contribution to the pension scheme was 14.1pc; this year it has reached double that at 28.68pc.
Those who support sound public finances and are appalled by unaffordable public sector pensions may have been tempted to applaud that move. But in truth the measure has amounted to a levy on independent schools.
Those in the state sector have had their funding increase commensurately – and in any case employer pension contributions for public sector employees in a pay-as-you-go scheme are only a matter of churning government funds.
Gove's move is a major part of the reason for that fees at independent schools soared even before Labour imposed VAT, as the increased pension costs have been passed on to parents. As a result, middle-class parents have increasingly found themselves priced out of them.
Whether the extra funding for the pension scheme is a saving to the state at all is debatable, if it pushed parents out of choosing an independent education.
We do not have the details of what Phillipson may be planning to replace EHCPs with. But whatever Labour introduces, it is unlikely to be favourable to the private sector.
As well as being a world leader in private education generally, some of the UK's specialist independent schools are also at the very pinnacle of what can be done for children with special needs.
EHCP reform must not imperil these centres of excellence and damage the future prospects of thousands of children.
