The logic of charging VAT on private school fees | Letters

Priyanjali Malik says Labour will alienate “swathes” of middle-class voters by introducing VAT on private school fees (Letters, 3 October). Given that only 6.5% of pupils in the UK are privately educated, the word “swathes” seems an exaggeration.

Dr Malik also says it is the business of the parents if they choose to send their children to private school. A two-tier education system based on wealth is everybody’s business, as is the negative effect it has on the society we all live in.
Nick Richards
Burnham-on-Sea, Somerset

State education contributes to a more civilised society and a better-educated workforce, from which we all derive economic and social benefit. In the same way, taxation funds the police, giving us safer streets, and refuse collection, reducing disease. If Priyanjali Malik chooses to buy privilege for her children by paying private school fees, I see no reason why VAT should not be charged on this.
Stewart Goacher
Loughborough, Leicestershire

The “logical extension” of VAT on school fees, says Dr Priyanjali Malik, “is to ask those who turn to private medical care to pay VAT on that too, so that their care can subsidise a flailing NHS”. What a brilliant idea. It makes so much sense. Private medical care borrows NHS doctors and their NHS consulting rooms, so make its users repay these loans through VAT, with the proceeds helping to rescue the NHS.
Ian Bourne
London

Your correspondent says she and others make sacrifices to send their children to independent schools. Some families have to make sacrifices just to feed theirs.
Chris Jones
Bewdley, Worcestershire