Munira Wilson

Thank you, Mr Speaker. As we have a Treasury Minister rather than an Education Minister opening the debate for the Government, I say gently that he should look at what the Liberal Democrats proposed on reforming capital gains tax as a way to fund some of the important investment that we need in education, rather than looking at taxing parents’ choices to invest in their children’s education. The Government’s policy would undermine two important principles. First, education should simply not be taxed. As we have heard, all education provided by an eligible body, including university education, music lessons, and tutoring are exempt from VAT, and VAT should not be imposed on any of those things because education is fundamentally a public good. Secondly, parents have the right to choose what education setting is best for their child. As Liberals we have always championed choice, and believe that nothing should get in the way of those important choices. Of course we want to get to a point where every parent can choose a local state school that meets their child’s needs and gives them the best possible start in life, and opportunities to flourish. But let us be honest with ourselves: that is not the reality facing many parents today, especially when their children have special educational needs. Liberal Democrats have many times raised the crisis in SEND provision. Conservative cuts to school and council budgets mean that many parents and carers simply cannot get their children the support they deserve. The Minister talked a moment ago about sorting out state-school SEND provision, so that no parent with a child with SEND would need to send their child to a private school, but does he recognise that in order to sort out and fix our broken SEND system we will need not millions but billions of pounds? I am not entirely sure that the Chancellor will be giving that kind of money to the Department for Education.