VAT: Independent Schools

Alan Gemmell Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Alan Gemmell (Central Ayrshire) (Lab)]

Fourteen years of Tory neglect have left many of our schools on their knees. The situation is no better in Scotland. After 17 years of the SNP, Scotland’s once world-beating reputation for education has been tarnished. I regularly meet and hear from teachers whose passion and dedication is palpable, including Mrs Boyd and Miss McKay, the primary 6 teachers at Struthers primary school in Troon. Some 21 of their pupils have sent me individual letters asking me to join the fair trade campaign to “Be the Change”. However, over a quarter of children in north Ayrshire now live in poverty. That means that 6,234 children are held back, even before the school day begins. Conservative Members have forgotten about the effects of austerity on constituencies such as mine. They and the SNP are living in their own fantasies.

Having squandered reserves through financial incompetence, SNP-run North Ayrshire council faces £12.6 million of cuts in its upcoming budget. The situation has only been worsened by the council tax freeze imposed by the SNP in Holyrood. The council now proposes cutting 90 teaching posts between 2025 and 2027, and removing a total of 230 hours of pupil support assistance, equivalent to eight full-time staff; all school crossing patrols; one full-time post from the music service; and one full-time educational psychologist. That will be a travesty for children in north Ayrshire, and casts further shame on the SNP’s education record in Scotland.

The independent Institute for Fiscal Studies has said that this VAT policy will raise more than £1 billion, and will see significant additional education spend in England, which means significant Barnett consequentials for Scotland, and for the young people in my constituency. Today’s generation of young people deserve no less, after suffering year after year of excuses. This Government are not prepared to settle for more of the same.