Demand for England’s grammar schools falls – despite VAT on school fees

Claims that England's grammars will be "swamped" in September by pupils priced out of private schools by VAT on fees are unfounded, data from more than half of selective state schools suggests.

The number of children registered to sit the 11-plus entrance tests for grammar schools next September has fallen slightly compared with last year.

Figures covering 91 of the 163 grammars in England show that far from being inundated with applications from middle-class parents forced out of private schools by the imposition of 20% VAT, the total ­number of pupils registered to sit the tests has dropped from 80,317 last year to 80,091 this year.

At most schools, registration ran during the general election period, from May until July or August, when education news was dominated by Labour's policy to close the loophole that has allowed private schools to operate VAT-free for five decades.

Before the election, Conservative MPs claimed that fee hikes caused by the end of the tax exemption would lead to an influx of families trying to get their children into selective ­secondary state schools.

Robin Walker, the then chairman of the Commons education select ­committee, said that heavily oversubscribed grammars would be "where people would turn to first in many cases".

Mark Francois, a Conservative MP in Essex, also warned that the VAT plan would make private schools unaffordable for all but the wealthiest, with the rest likely to "swamp" local grammars with applications.

But data provided in response to a freedom of information request to all grammar schools in England reveals no such influx. Some have seen increases, others have experienced a drop in registrations, but total numbers fell. In Kent, the most selective county in England with 32 ­grammars, numbers dropped from 18,175 to 17,655.

Fewer families than last year also registered for the test at six of the grammar schools in Birmingham. In Bexley, south-east London, with four selective secondaries, 600 fewer children were signed up this year.

Numbers due to take the exam for entry to the five grammars in the south London borough of Sutton also dipped. In Essex, interest in the 11-plus did rise this year, but the numbers who registered were still lower than in 2022.

Michael Pyke, a spokesperson for the Campaign for State Education, said: "It's not in the least surprising that there are few indications of the influx into the state system that has been predicted. For many years ­private school fees have ­regularly risen above the rate of inflation without there being any decline in pupil numbers.

"What really is surprising is the amount of time and energy that has been devoted to an issue that affects very few children, while the ­appalling problems faced by the schools which educate 93% of our children have been almost completely ignored.

"Why are the problems of a very small minority, most of whom are pretty well off, deemed more important than those of the great majority of families?"

The estimated £1.5bn that will be raised by collecting VAT and applying business rates to the independent sector will be used to provide 6,500 ­teachers in state secondary schools, where staff recruitment is in crisis.

On Friday, the Independent Schools Council (ISC) called again for a delay in the implementation of the policy and threatened a high court challenge if ministers press ahead.

It said data collected from 1,185 ISC members showed a 1.7% drop in private school pupil numbers this September , compared with 2023. If extrapolated across all 2,500 private schools in the UK, it would amount to a drop in pupil numbers of more than 10,000, the ISC claimed.

Julie Robinson, ISC's chief executive, warned that ministers had underestimated the pupil displacement from private to state.

However, state school enrolments have also been falling because of the UK's declining birthrate over the past decade.

The Department for Education (DfE) said there was a 2.3% fall in applications for primary places this September, and a 1.7% fall in secondary applications.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) forecasts that the addition of VAT will, over time, result in between 3% and 7% of pupils moving from the private to the state sector, but said that the decline in the birthrate meant private school rolls were likely to fall even without the VAT issue.

Falling state school rolls means the state sector has capacity to absorb any outflow from the private sector, according to the DfE.