Welsh Secretary Jo Stevens criticised over ‘ignorance of devolution settlement’ in school fees row
Martin Shipton
Welsh Secretary Jo Stevens has been ridiculed after posting a message on social media that appeared to show ignorance of the devolution settlement.
Praising the introduction on January 1 2025 of VAT on private school fees, announced in her autumn Budget by Chancellor Rachel Reeves, Ms Stevens wrote: “And every penny raised through the removal of this tax break will be spent in our state schools.”
However, the UK Government of which she is a member does not have the power to order the Welsh Government or local authorities in Wales to spend the money in the way she suggests.
Many people criticised Ms Stevens on X, formerly Twitter. One, Maxwell Marlow, wrote: “Apart from the falsehood that this is a tax break, there is no indication of earmarking or hypothecating for this tax.”
Some messages were ruder, including one which described Ms Stevens as a “useless xxxxwit”.
‘Bad mistake’
A Welsh Labour source told us: “This is a very bad mistake by Jo Stevens. She or those who wrote this must be thick. Any money would go as a consequential to the Welsh Government, who could spend it on anything.
“If it went to local authorities they could spend it on anything unless it is ringfenced.
“How is she going to explain this if local authorities cut school budgets? She’s totally out of her depth.”
We wrote to the Welsh Government stating: “The Secretary of State for Wales has suggested in a social media posting that all the money derived from imposing VAT on school fees will be spent ‘in our state schools’:
“Quite a few people on social media have pointed out that this is a decision for the Welsh Government and local authorities. It would certainly be a departure from normal practice.
“What arrangements have been put in place to transfer a proportion of such VAT revenue to the Welsh Government, and has the Welsh Government made a policy decision to direct local authorities to spend such money in such a way?”
VAT
A Welsh Government spokesperson responded: “The UK Government’s Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has said that VAT from private schools will be spent on state education. Wales receives additional funding when spending on devolved areas, such as education, increases in England. It is up to the Welsh Government to decide how that money is spent.”
We sought comment from Ms Stevens’ government department, the Wales Office. We also drew the Wales Office’s attention to a TV interview between the journalist Robert Peston and Sir Keir Starmer from January 2024 when Sir Keir was still the Leader of the Opposition. Mr Peston challenged him over the serious problem of knife crime, asking where the money would come from to combat it.
Sir Keir responded: “We’ve set aside for this £100m, which will be taken from the money which is yielded from VAT on private schools, and use it for those support services to come together – the mentoring.
“I had three terrible cases in my constituency of teenagers being killed by knife crime, running up to 2019-2020, and we resolved to bring together this package of support in our schools, in our communities, in our hospitals, to ensure it is available. So we have put that money, £100m, aside. It’s the choice we make, which is to impose VAT on private schools and use some of the money from that to put it into this intervention, which I hope will drive down knife crime.”
Briefing notes
A spokesperson for the Wales Office was unable to answer our questions, but sent us a question and answer briefing note which states: “We have ended tax breaks on private schools to improve standards and opportunities for the nine out of 10 children who attend state schools.
The money raised from VAT will fund public services, including education priorities for the next academic year.
“How much money will this raise?
“The tax is expected to raise £1.725bn a year, according to the Treasury, to go towards the public finances and help improve education and outcomes for young people.”
The Wales Office said that if we wanted more information we should ask the Treasury directly.
We wrote to the Treasury, forwarding the Welsh Government quote and asking: “The Wales Office has been unable to tell me how money from VAT receipts will make it to Wales. Are we correct to assume that it will be ‘Barnettised’ with no direction to the Welsh Government over how it will be spent?”
A Treasury spokesperson responded: “The Welsh Government spokesperson quote is correct, any uplift to UK Government departmental budgets results in uplifts also to funding for devolved governments via the Barnett formula. So any extra funding for state schools in England will mean an uplift for the Welsh Government, given that education is a devolved responsibility.”
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That Treasury statement is hogwash.
Her attitude and ignorance of devolution doesn’t surprise me one bit. Jo Stevens is David TC Davies in a dress. Sadly Wales has another quisling as Welsh Secretary happy to stab their country in the back.
As someone who lives abroad, these sort of arguments just seems so petty.
A question serious journalists should be asking is whether Wales gets a Barnett’s formula allocation of total VAT receipt, or the VAT from Welsh private school tuition fees. A big difference!
As someone who lives abroad, I think it is hugely important to have a minister for Wales who actually has a basic understanding of how government works with respect to Wales, that the current incumbent can’t manage that is news of public interest because an incompetent minister IS news… Furthermore, how do you expect to get a sensible answer on VAT, Barnett, or anything else from someone who doesn’t understand how Welsh finances work at a basic level…
Of course she knows how devolution works. Do you think she even wrote this twitter comment?!
There is plenty of nonsense on social media coming from plaid, Tories and reform in recent months
This sort of bickering is typical of Welsh politics- focus on some daft social media comment from a young staffer than ask some probing questions!
LOL, That one ranks up there with, I had to have my mobile reset for security purposes, ‘there was no whatsapp group’/’well, actually there was a whatsapp group but it wasn’t official’, I lost my official mobile, I thought I was using my private email account, the dog ate my homework, a staffer in my office released this comment in error, I pressed return accidentally, I was looking for images of tractors…
You believe what you like, but no one is under any obligation to take it seriously…
Also, just for the record, IF it WAS a staffer, then it is still her responsibility for employing someone in her office who lacks basic understanding of how the political system actually works, it is a high ranking job for a Minister of State FFS, not apprentice window washer…
These ARE relevant questions, this IS ‘probing’, incompetence at ministerial level is extremely concerning, as is the fact that some people can pass it off as being of no consequence and then proceed to obfuscate the issue for partisan political purposes…
Well, somebody voted for these people, who are unable to understand their own party’s policy. Pitiful.
Two things we’ve learnt in the last few months is that, when it comes to policy matters, Jo Stevens is totally out of her depth in this role, and that her instincts and prejudices are those of a dyed-in-the-wool British Nationalist.
Worth rembering that every child educated in a private school saves the taxpayer roughly £5,000 to £10,000 a year – that’s how much it costs for a child to be educated in a state school. The government should, on economic grounds, be supporting private schools to some extent – the Australian government (both Labour and Conservative) has done this for many years – to save taxpayers’ money. Yes, one can argue on philosophic grounds aginst private schools but you cannot argue against private schools on economic grounds. But that is what Labour is arguing . Why am I not surprised… Read more »
Why should private schools not pay VAT? It is a luxury to send your child or children to a private school. Luxury goods and services have VAT paid on them. Why shouldn’t rich people pay VAT? You and I both know that VAT is a stealth tax designed to ensure working and middle class people pay more tax because the rich don’t want to pay their way. You and I also know that private schools having charitable status is a tax dodge. Rich people can cough up or go and live in off shore tax havens where the price of… Read more »
Weirdly I somewhat agree. It’s largely depends on how money is allocated to Wales out of this. The private schools are small, and many have international students. With the VAT recovery now possible from capital projects, it could well be we don’t make much money from this, unless Wales gets Barnett formula allocation from English VAT tax receipts.
It’s not as simple as this because of economies of scale. Your figure is presumably the total cost of education divided by the total number of students in education. But that’s not the same as the practical extra cost for a school of adding one more student to a class of 30.
Give the woman a colonial pith helmet and tell her what she can do with it.
Another outsider, showing her ignorance of Wales, and Devolution, it
s a bit like Fawlty Towers,Cant get the staff,All schools whether state or private are required to pay VAT on non educational expenditure and income e.g. sports facility income from outside bodies, energy unless exempted like some church aided schools.
The VAT being applied now is for fees.
There are set guides that LA’s have to follow when dealing with school VAT reconciliation.
The economic case from Treasury just does not add up.
Are you suggesting the figure quoted is simply 20% of the current fees without any consideration that VAT paid out can be reclaimed? Do you know this for a fact or are you assuming that the unelected Whitehall mandarins producing this data aren’t on the ball, or worse are playing politics?
Lightweight surrounded by dimwits – can’t expect much from that collective.
JS is our new Unionist Governor-General. She regularly votes against further devolution of powers. She doesn’t like devolution and doesn’t appear to want anything to do with it. So, being unable to grasp it’s workings just about fits the bill. This is Keir Starmer basically telling our govt that they are going to dance to his tune. Redcoats or Bluecoats, seems to make little difference. The Welsh Office should be scrapped. A pointless little place.