According to Steve Sinnott of the NUT in today's Metro (no link) "... Gordon Brown's commitment to raising spending on state schools to private school levels must be realised".
Right, over the last ten years, spending per state pupil has increased considerably, but schools are shitter than ever. Nulab have tested this 'throwing good money after bad' to destruction. But let's assume it were a worthy aim, how could we achieve this at the lowest cost to the taxpayer?
Quick stat summary ... spending per state pupil is £5,270 p.a. and average fees for private day schools are just under £10,000 p.a. There are about 9.5 million children in state education, so call it £50 billion total cost, and 0.5 million privately educated.
Hey ... how about offering education vouchers worth £4,000 p.a.?
Let's assume that 4.5 million children claim vouchers and move into privately* run education. That'd cost £18 billion, leaving £32 billion to spend on the remaining five million state pupils, increasing spend-per-pupil to £6,400 each.
Whereas the extra 4.5 million children whose parents go for vouchers clearly won't be the wealthiest households, so let's assume they can't afford to top up the vouchers with more than £50 per week per child on average, so the amount spent on each of those 4.5 million children will be £6,500 p.a, dragging the average spend per private pupil to something closer to £7,000 p.a.**
And then let's see what happens to relative standards in the state-run and the privately run, state-subsidised sectors!
C'mon Steve Sinnott ... are you up for it?
* 'Private' in this context does not mean evil capitalists. It includes private profit making companies, of course, but also parents' associations, churches, charities etc etc.
** Assuming that existing private schools keep spending per pupil at £10,000 and knock £4,000 off their fees, there again they might keep the top-up-fees at £10,000 and spend £14,000 on average, who knows? Who cares, frankly?
Thursday, 18 October 2007
Education spending
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10 comments:
Yes well said. I am amazed the 'socialists' oppose the idea of vouchers which can be spent in the private sector. The fact that the demand exists for the current feee level would suggets that the extra cash would be spent and not just subsidise the existing fees. It also moves kids out the 'state' sector and so increased per pupil funding within the state sector. Not rocket science.
WOuld be interesting to work some real numbers. I guess there would be a short term problem with capacity in the private sector.
BTW, i don't like your new scroll boxes in the right hand column. Very messy.
Vindico, those are real numbers.
Of course, you'd be mad to kick off with £4,000. You'd start with £500 and scrap charity tax breaks for schools (worth less than £500 per pupil on average). Then next year make them £1,000 and keep increasing it until some sort of opimum is reached, e.g. where average spending in state sector = average spend in private sector and/or the marginal tax saving to taxpayer flattens off.
I'm working on Ye Olde Scroll-boxes as we speak.
Years ago the Bursar of (I think) Newcastle Royal Grammar demolished the figures that made it look as if private day schools are much more costly than state schools. In ascending order of importance you have to allow for (1) different distributions of pupils -state schools get more cash for 6th formers than for younger children (or did then) so you should allow for the higher proportion of sixth formers in private schools (2) the state school figures are just running costs, but the private school fees also cover capital expenditure (3) the private school fees cover all admin costs whereas the state school figures always ignore the huge sums extracted by the LEA and Whitehall for their administrative services. His rough figures suggested that the difference calculated properly was probably less than 10%. So lets just scrap state-provided schooling shall we? In this country it's an experiment that's failed.
Dearime, thanks, most helpful, Jock Coats reckoned he'd found studies that showed the difference in spending was pretty small - about 10% maybe, like you say.
D'you have links to any of this?
Sorry, just my memory - which is not the most reliable. On the other hand, I read the article long before I realised that I was going to have to send the nipper private, so I read it in a pretty dispassionate spirit.
Mark,
Does your figure of 5270 pa include CAPEX or is it just the OPEX portion?
Independent school fees would surely have to include provision for capital expenditure and replacemnet whereas the government's numbers may well not reflect this.
And another question: That average figure; how does it vary between the pre-prep (5-7), prep (8-11) and secondary (12 to 18) age brackets?
RM, don't worry about capital/revenue distinction. Spending classified as capital in DfES accounts is minimal.
See also previous comments by Dearime - there is plenty of evidence that total spending in state and private sectors is hardly different. The £5,270 probably does not include pro rata cost of all the quangoes and LEA's, for example.
Aha, but therin lies a serious problem. Whether or not capital expenditure is minimal or not it still needs to be accounted for if one is to try and compare the two systems.
The same goes for the quango and LEA costs. The government obviously believes that they serve some purpose that benefits education. The private system obviously doesn't (otherwise they'd mimic them). Therefore those costs also need to be fully included. My own guess is that if one included those LEA costs spending would easily match that in the private sector. But without evidence it's hard to prove.
The problem is finding those numbers. As with everything this government does obfuscation and confusion seem to be the order of the day. Any ideas?
RM, I have added 'UK Education statistics' to my 'statistics and stuff' section.
Per page 57, there are 6.6 million kids between 5 and 16 or 18 at school. Per page 123, total spending (current and capital) on primary and secondary schools is £52 billion, including Teacher's Pensions.
This works out at £7,900 per pupil. Heaven only knows if this includes quangos and LEA's.
So, yes, there is no big difference between state and private sector spending per pupil.
Thanks, I'll go and look. My guess would be that the 7,900 does include the LEAs and quangos. My reasoning? Gordon still claims spending is below private sector levels which means he's probably subtracting the "overheads".
Now to work out how to divie that 7,900 average to reflect the difference in spending between infant, junior and senior schools. Such larks!
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