Lord Black of Brentwood (Con)

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Lexden on securing this debate and on his powerful speech. It is very good to see him in his place after a challenging few months. This is an important debate. As the Government, frankly, bury their head in the sand, wilfully refusing properly to monitor the impact of this dreadful policy, it falls to this House to do so. I declare my interests as chairman of governors at Brentwood School and honorary president of the Boarding Schools’ Association. I have three points, the first a general one about the implementation of this spiteful policy. When the Government were elected, Keir Starmer made a great deal about restoring trust in politics. Before the King’s Speech in 2024, he said: “The fight for trust is the battle that defines our political era”. Well, trust is founded on honesty but, with this policy, Labour has always been far from honest. It said there would be limited impacts on the numbers attending independent schools. It was not honest. The number of pupils has fallen by over 33,000—as we have heard, double the 14,000 it glibly estimated. It said there would not be significant school closures. It was not honest: some 106 mainstream schools have shut their doors, destroying jobs, displacing pupils and wrecking communities. It said it would use the money raised to fund new teaching places. It was not honest: the number of teachers has fallen. The Government said they were closing a loophole, knowing full well this was no loophole. It was not honest. Education has never been taxed and, by introducing one, the Government have created a glaring anomaly. No wonder they did not want to undertake a proper consultation before introducing this policy. They knew they would be found out, and so they have been. This is not an education policy but a class warfare policy, which has hit children and hard-working parents hard, and it is fraudulent. How can the Government claim to want to restore trust in politics when they so brazenly introduce a policy, knowing they are perpetrating a con trick on the public? It is breathtaking hypocrisy. It is little wonder trust in politics is still so low. Nowhere has the impact on this policy been more harshly felt than among our boarding schools, which is my second point. The UK’s boarding schools are the best in the world, a powerful tool of soft power contributing significantly to our economy. They are a jewel in the crown of the sector, with schools like Brentwood School attracting pupils from across the globe: 33 nationalities are represented among our boarders. VAT has hit boarding schools hard. The number of boarders at independent schools dropped by 12% to around 65,000 pupils between 2024 and 2026, a rate double that of the sector as a whole. More than 25 independent boarding schools have either closed, announced their impending closure or stopped boarding entirely. In the three years before the imposition of VAT, that figure was only nine—a third of the current rate—destroying the Government’s erroneous assertion that closures are simply part of a long-term trend. That is nonsense. This has disrupted children’s education, put teachers and support staff out of work and had a profound impact on local communities, where local boarding schools are a vital part of the fabric of local and community life. Given these stark statistics, can the Minister tell us how she plans to stop this deeply damaging trend and protect the remaining boarding schools in the sector? There is also an international aspect to this issue. The Government’s own international education strategy, published only in January, aims collectively to “grow education exports to £40 billion per year by 2030” and “promote the UK as a preferred destination for study”. Well, to do that, the UK needs a healthy and competitive boarding school sector, yet the Government’s policies are deliberately undermining it. The number of international students in independent schools is down 12% since the imposition of VAT. If the Government are to stand any chance of meeting their own ambitions, they will have to revisit this policy. Following on from my noble friend Lord Blackwell, my final point is about music and the arts. I declare an interest as chairman of the Royal College of Music. The case has frequently been made in this House about the tragic decline of music education in state schools, which this Government, despite their promises, have absolutely failed to reverse. That has put a huge burden on the independent sector, both to protect the future of music as it dies out in the state sector and to do what it can to support those in state schools who are desperate to learn an instrument or take part in an orchestra, or even just to sing, but who have no opportunity to do so. The role of independent schools in this area is vital. It is not something we have to do; it is something we absolutely want to do. In the last year alone, the Independent Schools Council has recorded almost 10,000 partnerships between independent schools on academic collaboration and enrichment. About 2,500 of these are centred on the arts, with over 600 schools providing over 2,200 partnerships to support state schools with joint musical events, participation in music lessons, dance events, access to concert halls and many other areas. Schools like Brentwood, which has one of the finest music departments in the country, provide an excellent example. This year, we are committed to an amazing project to offer all local state primary schools the opportunity for their pupils to participate in a mass concert performance of Rutter’s “Mass of the Children” at Brentwood Cathedral, part of an ongoing commitment to local partnerships. One of the reasons we are doing it is that, tragically, even singing, so crucial for young lives, is dying out in primary schools and we want to help. That takes time and money—something which is now under real pressure as a result of the imposition of VAT and the impact on revenues. Elsewhere in the country we see other shining examples of partnerships to ensure children from state schools get access to arts education that their own schools cannot provide. King’s College School in Wimbledon partners with local schools to deliver an annual community drama production. For more than 20 years, Lichfield Cathedral School music partnership has enabled over 30,000 pupils in 500 schools across the West Midlands to benefit from high-quality music education. The King’s School Canterbury has for seven years provided pupils from Canterbury city centre schools with free access to orchestral instrument tuition. The list goes on and on. Yet the Government’s misguided policies have put all that at risk, and I cannot understand why they do not see that. As revenues come under pressure it becomes increasingly difficult to provide such partnerships, and bursary funding is increasingly in demand, particularly for quality music education. Who loses out? It is the children who lose out from this policy. Time is running out. This debate has revealed the appalling impact of the education tax on the sector. I hope that the Minister will reflect on it and at the very least commit to a fresh review of the impact of this policy—including the withdrawal of business rates relief—with clear methodology and an open mind. Preferably, that would mean a credible independent study. I also hope to hear from my own Front Bench a clear commitment to repeal this cruel tax when we return to office, although I suspect that I may not. I have no doubt that the Minister will again say that she is interested in the 93% who go to state schools. Of course she is right to be so, but I believe a Minister of the Crown must be interested in the 100% and not ignore 7% of children. Great damage has been done to our world-class independent schools. It is time to put dogma aside and put the interests of parents and children first.