Labour has said that 32 boarding schools will be exempt from its VAT raid following an outcry from headmasters, The Telegraph can reveal.
State boarding schools, which cost around £12,000 a year, will not be subject to the levy, a Labour source confirmed after the party was forced to clarify the terms of the planned tax raid.
It comes as headteachers warned dozens of comprehensives would become “collateral damage” from Sir Keir Starmer’s tax raid on private schools.
The State Boarding Forum (SBF), which represents the sector, said it was repeatedly ignored after writing to Labour in December and again last month over concerns state school pupils would see fees rise under the tax plans.
After The Telegraph raised the issue, a source close to shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson today said that the schools would not be forced to pay 20pc VAT under a Labour government.
The climbdown is the first Labour has made over the controversial policy, with some special needs pupils and children from military families still yet to learn how it will apply to them.
State boarding schools are funded by the taxpayer but parents pay a fee of up to £20,000 for boarding. Around 4,600 pupils board at the comprehensives.
Chris Pyle, chairman of the SBF, which represents state boarding schools in England, said Labour did not respond to a letter he sent in December warning VAT would “hamper” schools’ ability to provide “vital” accommodation to pupils.
The letter said VAT on fees would “threaten the viability of boarding at some state schools and the employment of 730 staff who work in state boarding.”
Mr Pyle told The Telegraph: “We’ve written to Bridget Phillipson, the Labour [shadow] education secretary a couple of times asking whether there is any clarity over if VAT would apply to state boarding fees as well and we have not had any reply at all.”
Mr Pyle, who is also headmaster at state boarding school Lancaster Royal Grammar School, which has 140 boarding pupils, sent a follow-up letter last month which he said also received no response from Labour.
“I presume that the Labour Party is not interested in undermining the state sector,” he said, adding that he had feared state boarding schools might be “collateral damage” in its plans to force private schools to pay VAT.
“State boarding fees aren’t about accessing elite public schools by any means. We are just conventional state schools,” he said.
“All of the state boarding schools will, from time to time, use their boarding provision as a lifeline to pupils where their families are in distress.
“We had an example of this in school last year [of a] very difficult domestic situation [where] we took a pupil on zero notice overnight and we were then able to provide continuity of care to that child for the next few months.
“If the state boarding sector declines there simply will be fewer places available to those [vulnerable] pupils.
Labour plans have caused “confusion in the sector,” he said. “We’ve certainly had one or two boarding parents asking should we be worried about this.”
Morgan Thomas, headteacher at Royal Alexandra and Albert School, a state boarding school in Reigate, Surrey, said much was still “uncertain” about Labour’s plans.
He added that the school had been “cautiously optimistic that VAT would not be levied on state boarding schools”.
David Walker, director of the Boarding Schools Association, which represents 600 schools, said children in state boarding accommodation had faced “disrupted” education under the prospect of VAT being charged on fees for accommodation.
He said: “Young people would potentially have their education interrupted. They are going to state boarding schools for stability, when I go to these schools and talk to young people they love it. They are having a brilliant education. The last thing they want is for it to be disrupted.”
Sir Keir has promised he will make private schools pay VAT on school fees “straight away” if the party wins the general election on July 4.
It is understood VAT will apply to both tuition fees and boarding fees for private schools, which are usually paid separately.
Labour has so far offered few details about what its plans will mean in practice, also causing uncertainty for families with disabled children who receive subsidised private school education.
Downham Preparatory School in Norfolk, where children with special needs (SEND) make up a third of pupils, said this month that it would close in July. The principal at the family-run blamed the possibility of having to pay VAT under a Labour government for the closure.
Local authorities fund placements for SEND children at some private schools and it is not clear how they would be expected to pay for a potential leap in fees under Labour. Military families also face being priced out of private schools or forced to leave the Armed Forces altogether by Labour’s proposed tax raid.
Schools have warned the state-backed Continuity of Education Allowance, which requires servicemen to pay at least 10pc of fees themselves their children’s private education, would become unaffordable under Labour’s plans.
A Labour Party spokesman said: “It is not, nor has it ever been, our policy to impose VAT on state boarding schools.
“The next Labour government will break down the barriers to opportunity by investing in all of our state schools and recruiting over 6,500 new teachers through ending the tax breaks for private schools.”
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