Neil Johnson

@quietnitein @katie74RT @vickygrayson_ @AWMurrison @bettyBT100 @alexburghart @joenutt_author @bhatti_saqib @IsabelPat1886 I find the accounts of private schools masquerading as state schools (i.e., academies) far more interesting: x.com/warwickmansell…

@katie74RT @vickygrayson_ @AWMurrison @bettyBT100 @alexburghart @joenutt_author @bhatti_saqib @IsabelPat1886 Look at the accounts of the schools in question Katie.

Three historic private schools close after combined 333 years - How many more of these amazing schools will be forced to close under this Government? 😖 @vickygrayson_ @AWMurrison @bettyBT100 @alexburghart @joenutt_author @bhatti_saqib @IsabelPat1886 wiltshiretimes.co.uk/news/26052751.…

@Dave9876543 @philmcraig @FreeNationTalk x.com/drneiljohnson/…

@philmcraig @FreeNationTalk Its a promise delivered.

VAT on private school fees was sold as a policy on two grounds. 1) Taxpayers were “subsidising” private education of the wealthy. 2) The policy would raise £1.5 billion a year and fund 6,500 new teachers. These were both lies, and have been proven to be so. The Adam Smith Institute (ASI) suggests that the net cost to the economy of this crazy policy could reach as much as £1.58 billion. In other words 1. Private schools were actually already subsidising state education. 2. Rather than filling the public purse with extra revenue this policy is sucking funds out of the public sector pot. Once again, as with every major government policy, these people were elected on a raft of lies and invalidated assumptions.

@chloembroidery @Alan851603 @DrNickA @joemichalczuk Correct. And your bonus question: who abolished free milk in secondary schools?

@drneiljohnson @Alan851603 @DrNickA @joemichalczuk Oh me ! That would be Labour , That had the supper dumb idea of comprehensive education. ! Let’s shove square pegs through round holes and wonder why it doesn’t work ! Look at wales !

Out of all the decisions this government has made, this is one of the very worst (and it’s a long list) - simply because it was made without proper due diligence and driven by the politics of envy, chasing a cheap headline. It is a bitter, spiteful policy that shows no regard for the children immediately affected - not to mention the local economies that rely on these schools: teachers, caterers, sports clubs, cleaners, maintenance - the list goes on. As predicted, schools are closing, and more pupils are being pushed into the state sector, adding pressure and cost where the system is already stretched. Private education is one of Britain’s success stories. Countries around the world try to emulate these schools or send their children to them. So of course it makes sense that this government - which seems to resent British success - would want to undermine them with the stroke of a pen. Not only that - it has made private schooling MORE elitist. Eton, Harrow, the very top end - were always going to be fine, as were the families who can afford those fees. It is the mid-tier schools - and the aspirational families who stretch to afford them - who are taking the hit. The local tradesman, the local GP - the families for whom this was a genuine choice for their children. For them, that choice is now gone. Children have been pulled out of their schools. People have lost their jobs - all for nothing. This is a government that seems to hate Britain, its culture and traditions - and is determined to crush hope and aspiration within it.

@Alan851603 @DrNickA @joemichalczuk Elitist education, you say? Like these schools: x.com/vickygrayson_/…

@DrNickA @joemichalczuk Hang on - what about the permanent harm to individual children and society being done by elitist education? The normalisation inequality does massive harm.

@Alan851603 @chloembroidery @DrNickA @joemichalczuk Remind me who closed the grammar schools?

@chloembroidery @DrNickA @joemichalczuk Maximum social mobility was 1945-1970 when decent education became acessible to all. That slowed after 1980 with cuts to public education budgets and the rise of "Me first culture". We had decent Grammar Schools modelled on Public Schools but State funded open to all on ability.

Absolutely agree! When parents decide to send their kid to state school, that decision is subsidised by the taxpayer (most parents don’t pay enough tax to cover the cost of education their own children). And if they switch from private to state they may reduce working hours so less NI+IT. When parents decide to pay for their kid’s education themselves (independent school or home schooling) then they are subsidising the taxpayer: the child does not take up a school place that the parents are subsidising through taxes (saving the taxpayer ~£8k/yr), and in some cases work more hours to cover the fees (so more NI+IT). Financially at least that sounds like a win-win for the taxpayer.

@anaboultertv @dshensmith You can pay to send your children to go wherever you like, the taxpayer shouldn't be subsidising that decision

100% agree. @dshensmith

I've been thinking about this (because you keep posting the same message again and again and again). What was promised in Labour's manifest were the policies listed below on the right, with the VAT and business rates (on the left) the means to deliver those promises. And since those policies are slated for delivery in 2028-29 then (checks calendar) you can't say they have been delivered, because we're not there yet.

@BrokenSkiesPG @anaboultertv @dshensmith The vat is a promise delivered.

@Crofter1798 @TheScholar44 @julesw1lko @Karendu32435656 @bphillipsonMP Should or must? That’s a very dangerous path.

@TheScholar44 @julesw1lko @drneiljohnson @Karendu32435656 @bphillipsonMP Parents already pay for general education. Jules raises the interesting point that send provision brings extra costs and the send kids parents should be paying that bill

Vile heinous spite @bphillipsonMP Zero revenue raised

@julesw1lko @TheScholar44 @Karendu32435656 @bphillipsonMP Meanwhile, DfE data: x.com/hilscie/status…

@TheScholar44 @Karendu32435656 @bphillipsonMP That’s a lie

@Charles40658301 @MerrynSW From what I've read many economists would agree with you - in the long term (10-20+ years). In the short term: no. Paying down the mortgage, bumping up your pension, foreign holidays, reduce working hours, private tutors, ISA savings for university fees, and so on.

@MerrynSW Research by the Scottish Council of Independent Schools… If you read it , it quickly falls apart. Eg assumes that money previously spent on school fees now disappears rather than being spent elsewhere

VAT on private schools. Sounded good. New report says cost Scottish econ 900 jobs, £60m and counting. Pupil numbers down 9%. If this was social engineering it's working. If money raising, not so much.

@LordBalthazar85 @iAmJoshHunt Oh absolutely, but even with other income sources, why is it not simple? Why do we have to make it complex? Bugs and loopholes love complexity to hide in.

@drneiljohnson @iAmJoshHunt I mean fine. But you have no more agency over that than you do gross except if you decide to use pension. I think it’s partly a global standard and partly the fact that taxes are constantly changing (always upwards) and depend on circumstances eg If I had other income

Let me walk you through the financial reality of the average person in Britain. Because the numbers tell a story that most people feel but have never seen laid out. Start with net worth. Everything you own minus everything you owe. The median household net worth in the UK is £293,700. That sounds reasonable. Until you break it down. According to the ONS, around 40% of that is property wealth. Money locked inside a house you live in that you can only access by selling it or borrowing against it. 35% is private pension wealth. Money you cannot touch until age 55 under current rules, rising to 57 from 2028. 10% is physical possessions. Your car, your furniture. And 14%, roughly £41,000, is net financial wealth. Savings, investments, and ISAs, minus any financial liabilities like credit cards and loans. So the typical British household has a net worth of nearly £300,000 on paper. But only around £41,000 of that is financial wealth, and even that is not the same as cash in the bank. It includes investments that may take time to sell and ISAs that may be locked in fixed terms. Most of Britain's "wealth" is theoretical. It exists on a spreadsheet. It doesn't exist in anyone's bank account. And that's the median. Half of households have less than that. Now look at what people actually have saved. The FCA's Financial Lives survey found that one in ten UK adults has no cash savings at all. A further 21% have less than £1,000 to draw on in an emergency. One in four UK adults has been classified as having low financial resilience. Commercial surveys paint an even starker picture. A nationally representative 2026 Finder survey found that 16% of adults, around 8.9 million people, reported having no savings. Two in five said they had £1,000 or less. A quarter had £200 or less, which is less than the average person spends in a single week. Average savings for under-55s were just £9,888, dragged up by a small number of higher savers. The Money and Pensions Service reports that 11.1 million working adults on modest to low incomes do not regularly save at all. Now break it down by age. Because this is where the generational divide becomes undeniable. If you're aged 16 to 24, the median household net worth is £15,200. If you're 25 to 34, it rises to £109,800. But most of that is property equity if you've managed to buy, or pension wealth you can't access for decades. If you're 35 to 44, it's £209,600. Getting better, but again mostly locked in housing and pensions. If you're 55 to 64, median household wealth is £496,500. If you're 65 to 74, it peaks at £502,500. That peak is 33 times higher than the youngest group. Thirty-three times. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has found that there has been no substantial generation-on-generation wealth increase for anyone born from the 1960s onwards. The escalator that carried the post-war generations upward has stopped. Millennials are less likely to own a home by their early 30s than Gen X were at the same age. And Gen Z is entering adulthood into the most expensive housing market, the highest tax burden, and the weakest wage growth in modern history. Now look at the divide that sits underneath all of this. Property. The ONS reports that households who own their home outright have wealth more than 15 times higher than those who rent privately or from a social landlord. If you got on the housing ladder, your wealth accumulated almost automatically through rising property prices. If you didn't, you have almost nothing. Homeownership is the single biggest determinant of whether someone in Britain builds wealth or doesn't. And homeownership among young adults has collapsed. Then there's the regional picture. Median household wealth in the South East is £489,800. In the North East it's £179,900. The South East is 2.7 times wealthier. Same country. Same tax system. Same government. Fundamentally different economic realities. And at the extremes, the picture gets sharper. The wealthiest 10% of households hold assets of £1.2 million or more. The bottom 10% have £16,500 or less. Around 8% of households have negative net worth. They owe more than they own. And the top 1% hold at least £3.1 million. Now put all of this together. The typical British household has £293,700 in net worth, of which only about £41,000 is net financial wealth and even less is actual cash. The FCA says one in ten adults have no cash savings at all and a quarter have low financial resilience. The generational wealth escalator has broken. Renters have a fraction of the wealth of homeowners. The North East has a third of the wealth of the South East. And real wages have barely grown in fifteen years. The Resolution Foundation has described this period as one of severe economic stagnation. But the most striking thing about these numbers is not what they say about people who aren't working. It's what they say about people who are. The median full-time salary in the UK is about £37,400 a year. For someone paying income tax, National Insurance, a workplace pension contribution, and student loan repayments, take-home pay can be around £2,300 a month. ONS data shows average household spending is roughly £2,700 a month. Those aren't directly comparable figures, one is an individual earner, one is a household. But they help explain why, for the growing number of households relying on a single income, or where both earners are on modest salaries, there is almost no margin left. And where there is no margin, there is no saving. And without savings, there's no investment. Without investment, there's no compounding. Without compounding, there's no wealth. The cycle never starts. This is not a picture of a wealthy country. It is a picture of a country where wealth is concentrated in property and pensions, locked away from the people who need it most, distributed unevenly by age, region, and tenure, and increasingly inaccessible to anyone born after 1970. And the next time someone tells you Britain is the sixth richest country in the world, ask them where the money is. Because for millions of people it's nowhere. For a quarter of the population it wouldn't cover a month's emergency. And for the working people in the middle, it's mostly locked inside a house they can't sell and a pension they can't touch. The "fifth richest country in the world". Where a quarter of the population couldn't survive a month without income. Where real wages haven't grown in fifteen years. And where the average working person's actual accessible wealth would barely cover three months' rent. That's not wealth. That's the appearance of wealth. And the gap between the two is the story of modern Britain.

@LordBalthazar85 @iAmJoshHunt Right now, if I see a job advertised with a salary of £X/yr I don't actually receive that, I receive less. Because taxes. To know what I will be getting I need to do calculations. Why make it so difficult?

@LordBalthazar85 @iAmJoshHunt No, you only own your net. The government decides how much they take from you via taxes. You can change your net by changing job, but the relationship between gross and net is not under your control. So why talk about gross?

@Labster73 @EdwdPrice @JStanton28514 @CF_Farrow Recognised by whom? x.com/rastokke/statu…

@EdwdPrice @JStanton28514 @CF_Farrow Again, look at Finland. Widely recognised as one of, if not the best education system worldwide

My son, like thousands like him, has no school place for September and is unlikely to get one. If VAT hadn't been put on school fees we could have had him sorted 2 years ago. Surrey county council are doing literally nothing to help so we had to call in children's services. Who are also appalled.

@JStanton28514 @EdwdPrice @CF_Farrow If you want to point to schools that don’t pay VAT then that would be state schools, who claim back any VAT paid. The change in VAT now allows private schools to claim back any VAT they’ve paid. So, ironically, private schools now do not pay VAT, whereas before they did.

@drneiljohnson @EdwdPrice @CF_Farrow As it should always have been

They do pay VAT. They've always paid VAT. What has changed is that school fees PAID FOR BY PARENTS are now subject to VAT at the full 20% rate. See: #full-publication-update-history" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">gov.uk/guidance/vat-o… Charities pay VAT when they buy goods and services that are VATable. E.g., when Oxfam buys chocolate biscuits for the staffroom they pay VAT.

@EdwdPrice @CF_Farrow I do not hate private schools. They are not charities and should pay VAT just like state schools

I’d say that most, if not all, grammar schools are “hardly newly established”, however what is new is the additional pressure on places due to the changes in tax on indi schools, resulting in many closing and pushing those kids into the state sector - some even mid-year. Of course there have always been some parents who gamed the system, but with the rate of closures now (see @hilscie’s data) I can see this becoming much more prevalent. It will take some time for the effects to be truly understood - there are several different mechanisms in play here - but at the very least is the starting position outlined by the government: 100 equivalent schools closing and 1000s of children shifting to the state sector. The only question is how much worse is it going to get? At least the SoS for Education has the luxury of an upper bound on the damage: all indi schools closed and all kids in state education.

@drneiljohnson @GuyEmma68700 Well it’s hardly an original insight and The Royal GS is hardly newly established. The same thing is true all over.

This is exactly what we warned would be a consequence of the Education Tax. Predicted and predictable as MC families priced out of independent schools. Why is anyone surprised that parents will try and do the best for their children? inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyl…

@PaulKetchley @GuyEmma68700 I'm simply pointing out what has happened, and what may happen in the future. It is a well-known observation (see DfE paper I linked) that good schools push up house prices in catchment areas.

@drneiljohnson @GuyEmma68700 You think Colchester house prices are in some way depressed? I suggest you go and check them out.

@PaulKetchley @GuyEmma68700 "House prices near the best schools are higher than in the surrounding areas for both primary and secondary schools. The value of houses near the poorest performing schools are also lower than in the surrounding areas." assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a82a832…