School fees VAT policy

Angela Rayner

SHADOW Education Secretary Angela Rayner said imposing VAT on private school fees to pay for free meals for all primary school pupils would "level the playing field between children."

Party leader Jeremy Corbyn announced the policy yesterday and said the universal roll out of free meals will boost the health and educational attainment of all children while ending a "subsidy to the privileged few".

The Labour leader said ending VAT relief on private school fees could raise as much as £1.5billion ­­- enough to cover the £900million cost of extending free school meals to all primary school children in England. Private schools use their charitable status to avoid paying VAT and claim business rate relief.

Mr Corbyn pointed to research from the National Centre for Social Research and the IFS showing that offering universal access to free school meals improves pupils' productivity, enabling primary school pupils to advance by around two months on average.

Poor diet

However, one of the co-authors of the report told the BBC's Today programme that they had found a "slight improvement" on pupils' attainment, but "we certainly do not know if this impact will replicated nationwide".

Their 2012 report was based on a pilot in primary school pupils in Newham and Durham.

Writing for the Independent website, Ms Rayner also said Britain faces a serious health crisis linked to a poor diet and almost 20 per cent of children are obese by the time they leave primary school at 11.

Ms Rayner said: "Only seven per cent of children in England attend private school. VAT on private school fees will raise at least £1.3bn, enabling us to fully fund this policy.

"Labour's policy will benefit the education and health of all children by ending a subsidy to the privileged few.

"I'm a mum and I hate the thought of any child going a whole day at school without a healthy meal.

"Give children healthy food and they behave better at school, concentrate more in class and perform better in exams."