LOL, for real?!

Use your tax free cash from a Pension and make sure you are over 55 and have £200k in it?

Invest a couple of hundred thousand in an offshore bond and set the children as beneficiaries?

Here's a newsflash for you - these things happen all the time, I'd say 99.999999999% of the time the money is not used to pay school fees but to pay of mortgages, buy cars, avoid IHT, gift money to children etc etc

These things have nothing to do with school fees exclusively except the one about paying hundreds of thousands of advance fees - it should be obvious that no-one is getting 3.5% interest on account these days and I'm not sure most schools would like to play the stock market with required teaching funds so I think you will have to try harder and look again.

Of course one poster mentioned earlier that each child is subsidised to the tune of around £250pa so that is far worse than the state paying the tens of thousands that would be required to teach them should the child not be in private education.

Ditch your envy and jealousness, take a deep breath and then calmly try to explain why the state does not benefit from children being taken out of state education (which will ultimately also be to the child's educational benefit) to the sum of tens of thousands of pounds each child and why it would be a good idea to tax private education which will ultimately result in more children going back to state schools costing us all more money and providing that child a worse education.

I think you've missed the point entirely with the first bit there. The point being made is that private schools declare themselves as charities for the purpose of tax avoidance, worth more than 250 pounds per child per year. They are allowed to do this in return for offering some degree of socially useful activity. What this must constitute is unclear. I might ring up Eton and ask if my fictional Sunday league team can use their rugby pitch in return for tax exemption.

The other relevant point is that apparently parents don't have to pay VAT on school fees. Whether paying this would price them out or not I don't know (I suspect not). But this nonsense argument about easing the burden on the state sector needs to be exposed here.
Firstly, education is an investment, not a cost. The return on investment for a fully funded comprehensive system would produce far better outcomes, a more educated society, more technical skill in general, hence a demand for higher wages, higher taxes, more spending, more investment, ie. a growth economy based on investment. This would be aided by a shrinking private sector toward full inclusion.
Second, you ignore the state contributions to the private sector through teacher training, historic investments in education and labour for school staff, public infrastructure, primary schooling and so on.
Thirdly, if you really want to open the can of worms about who pays for what, let's talk about whether private schools should exist at all. How about let's close them all down, sell off their substantial assets and impose massive tax hikes on the super rich to pay for the influx of all the little Gemimas and Tarquins into our local comps. I don't think the propagandists in the Tory press quite have this in mind.

Btw per pupil funding isn't tens of thousands, it's around 4500. See how the public sector gives much better value for money.

It is a simple point. Private schools are businesses. They are not charities. Eton and Harrow are not charities. Their fees are considerable. They should pay tax like other corporations.

Oh yeah I must also comment on Tim Farron's claim that the Lib Dems came up with the idea first, for reception-Y2, which I can tell you is very useful indeed for families. Except they decided not to fund it at all, expecting struggling schools to cough up.

They are charities and not businesses. This isn't a slightly difficult concept. What tax do you think they should pay? Do you think they are profit making organisations? Who gets the profits?

btw do you think that further education fees should be subject to VAT?

One of my friends from primary school went to a private school. His parents weren't rich or even close to it. It was only about 20 years later I found out they'd taken him out of school as he was being bullied. The family definitely wasn't rich or super rich. Not every private school is oxford or Cambridge

Not for profit is not the same as a charity. Eton and Harrow do not meet any sane definition of charity.

Oxford and Cambridge are universities, not schools. I'm assuming you know this and misspoke-if not I'm not sure why you mentioned them and would appreciate clariification.

There are some relatively poor families who somehow manage to send their kids to private schools. I would hope Corbyn would create some kind of incentive for private schools to help these people. I would be surprised if he hasn't already drafted something to that effect.

I have known similar people, school teachers and such. The most surprising was a shopkeeper - not the owner mind, just a worker who worked in 3 different shops, had come here from Sri Lanka and said the schools here are crap And yes not every private school is Eton/Harrow, some are more affordable. A dual earner family on modest incomes could in theory afford it, assuming they are willing to give up on foreign holidays and one or perhaps both cars. Single earner families and the low paid have no chance even if they wanted it. But the jealously does seem to come more from those who probably could afford it at a push but don't want to give up on their luxuries that put them ahead of the poor, the same attitude that drives them to want a privately educated child, I assume.

But that's not the issue here. The elite school their children privately, it's where they learn to lead, to manage, to be in control, to rule. Here is where the behaviours, attitudes, skills and discipline for those born into privilege is learned. And why shouldn't the working and middle class want a bit of it as well. Regardless of this, the private/state divide is the most fundamental division in education, it entrenches inequality, enforces the class divide. It's not surprising The Sun and The Telegraph and the rest of them talk of class war at the slightest attempt to redress the balance.

I'm going to make a wild stab in the dark and assume he doesn't think [higher?] education fees should be paid at all, let alone subject to tax.

Are we still talking about private school fees?

If so, I believe that in the name of equality of opportunity they should be taxed. No reason anyone would realistically send their kids to private school except for a better education. If and when we truly achieve equality of opportunity (the moral justification for the free market), private schools will be eliminated by the market.

It isn't really a "better education". It is the connections they get. If you went to school with the son of the minister for social affairs then it is easier to get that summer internship.

and why won't this happen if you and "the son of the minister for social affairs" go to a state school?

Peter Oborne from the Spectator on the suspect 'intelligence' of the photos of the victims of chemical warfare in Syria:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mU0ext1vTCU

It is rather frightening when the political establishment develop collective amnesia and forget the lessons that were supposed to be learned post Blair. Or perhaps they support the agenda regardless.

Just been looking at some of the recent by-election results. Labour are still pretty much a train-wreck but it looks like there could be a bit of a Lib Dem revival on the way? (although it should be noted in some areas it looks as though they're fielding candidates for the first time)

If anyone ever wonders about the level of political debate we see in Scotland well here's an SNP MSP tweeting on the upcoming elections. Don't exepct to see any criticism of him from the party leadership though (despite them calling for a 'mature' debate a couple of days ago)

I think you need to a) get a sense of humour and b) acknowledge the very serious point i am guessing he is alluding to - the horrendous tory policy of putting rape victims through humiliating procedures for a few extra much needed pennies to feed their children.

Get a sense of humour? He's the shadow leader of the SNP group in the Commons and the chair of the Scottish Affairs Committee. I'm pretty certain your reply would've been completely different if a senior Tory had posted this.

Like i said the major issue is, i assume, the humiliating bureaucratic procedure which rape victims are being put through to claim what is rightfully theirs. Which is tory policy so it would be odd for them to post something like the above.
The gag was quite funny, in an admittedly childishly crude sense but comedy is comedy. Take Boris Johnston. Awful views and vile politics but a funny guy all the same.

You fail to undertand the simple reality of the situation. It's absolutely nothing at all to do with what you think.

The reality is the meme was meant to point out everone who isn't pro indy are 'wanks'. That is the reality of the country I live in. If you're not pro-indy you're a 'traitor', a 'quisling' etc etc

If you want me to explain further I will. It's not difficult and I can't really comprehend why it should be so difficult to understand.

I should also add, if you think the 'rape clause' thing is the major issue then you are incredibly out of touch. We're looking at an economy that is about to go into recession, that is a major issue.

No its not hard to understand that an opportunist nationalist party plays the nationalist card, and also plays on general hatred in Scotland for the Tories. There is a more important issue above, reference to the 'rape clause' which I can only assume is about the new procedure rape victims have to go through to claim child benefit, which you seem to be ignoring with a random 'it's the economy stoopid'.

I've just looked it up, here:

http://www.rapecrisisscotland.org.uk...-as-it-sounds/

SNP supporting the campaign.

Why? What makes you think he'd be that keen on the SNP? Can't speak for Tom but I loathe the bastards for gifting the Tories the last election.