ONE can’t help but suspect political motivation behind moves to hit independent schools financially (“Private schools warn pupils will be hit by rates bill plan”, The Herald, August 23).
The SNP’s central education target, unquestioned by all other Holyrood parties, is to “close the attainment gap”. This would entail pupils from the wealthiest families performing at an identical level to those from the least well off backgrounds. On this view, costly independent schools that provide excellent education clearly contribute to the “attainment gap,” and are, therefore, part of the problem.
The whole “attainment gap” philosophy is founded on the false assumption that all children are equally capable of academic progress, or that academic ability is evenly distributed across social classes, and that divergences of outcome must therefore be caused by structural injustices in society. Our education system should provide the opportunity to excel for all pupils, focusing additional attention on those facing particular difficulties. The goal should be raising attainment for all, not “closing the attainment gap”.
To quote from our policies: “Independent schools should enjoy charitable status automatically, as educating children to a high standard is a good to society.”
Richard Lucas,
Scottish Family Party,
272 Bath Street, Glasgow.
RE your article on private schools objecting to the new business rate proposals; it's worth noting that church buildings are currently largely exempt.
Last year the Church of Scotland was shown to be one of the country’s most significant land and property owners, with more than 4,000 ecclesiastical buildings and 12,500 acres of land with a then capitalised value in excess of £515 million - quite a property business. The churches claim that all their buildings by default benefit the community, something no doubt private schools, sports clubs, universities and others hit by the new proposals could also claim.
I have no doubt any move to tax the churches would be met with the now familiar allegation of “Christian persecution” which usually accompanies any challenge to religious privilege. We have already seen this “tax on faith” argument over Sunday parking charges when apparently it's right that Sunday shoppers, workers and tourists should pay for parking but not church-goers. Surely it's time the churches paid their taxes too, in the interests of fairness and of genuinely benefitting the wider community?
It's worth recalling that the churches were quick off the mark to score PR points by condemning the likes of Starbucks, Google and Amazon for tax avoidance. Is this this another case of “don't do as we do, just do as we say”?
Alistair McBay,
National Secular Society, 5 Atholl Crescent, Edinburgh.
IF we can give tax-breaks to profitable global oil corporations that they may decommission North Sea oil infrastructure why can’t those small businesses prepared to contribute to the vitality of our city and town centres be treated in the same considerate manner?
Local taxation is a major stumbling-block. Both local and central government are funded by taxes and by borrowing from the same banking system as do the general public. The UK Government will borrow in the order of £60 billion this financial year but £44 billion of that will be returned to the same source as interest repayments on the almost £2 trillion accumulated national debt. If we agree that “new” money needs to be created in order to stimulate economic growth the question has to be asked why this power is held by cartel that is run in the interests of a tiny fraction of society rather than one which channels any profits towards all of us. After all, the social system that allows the banking system to function and profit is created and funded by us, not them. The ludicrous nature of the current system means that the Bank of England holds £400 billion of our own Government debt and in theory we paid ourselves £11 billion pounds of debt interest this financial year on our own debt. If we can do that with some of the debt we can do it with all of it.
It’s easy to see that the UK taxation system favours the rich and those who can afford accountants and tax avoidance schemes; likewise our financial system is loaded in favour of the top one per cent. What is harder to see during a period of unparalleled levels of personal debt and a contracting economy exacerbated by austerity and Brexit is any future scenario that is palatable to the majority of us.
Until drastic steps are taken to overhaul the entire taxation and monetary systems and how local and central government is funded, then escalating local taxes will ensure that small businesses will progressively find it economically nonviable to trade in our city streets and they and our town centres will progressively become a wasteland of bookies and charity-shops.
David J Crawford,
Flat 3/3 131 Shuna Street, Glasgow.
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