Based on a quick glance at headlines from the rightwing press, you might be led to believe that the world as we know it is coming to an end. But this apocalypse is not related to the climate emergency, or geopolitics, or a new pandemic. No, it will come, apparently, as a result of Labour’s plan to add VAT to private school fees.
Intent on corralling their loyal readerships into the same frothing hysteria, these outlets blare, like foghorns, variations on a theme: VAT on private school fees is an iceberg to the Titanic that is that cornerstone of British life, the public school. They scoff at the £1.5bn the policy would raise, a sum that could be used to recruit 6,500 new secondary school teachers at a time when only half of the required numbers in England are training to enter the profession. Since the public is too thick to see what is truly at stake here and the Tories are all but mincemeat, it’s left to these parts of the press to resolutely speak truth to power.
