Labour lacks good ideas for improving Britain’s schools
Making private ones a bit more expensive is not an inspiring start
IN MID-DECEMBER Tim Jonas’s daughter said goodbye to friends and teachers at her private school in Wakefield, in Yorkshire. Mr Jonas, a web developer, says his family can no longer cover the nine-year-old’s fees, now that Britain’s Labour government is adding 20% in value-added tax (VAT). None of the 44 state primaries in Wakefield could guarantee her a place, so she is going to one a few miles out of town. Mr Jonas says he feels “fairly positive” about the move, now that it is under way. But he regrets that he has had to pull his daughter out of a school where she was happy and doing well.
Britons brace themselves for more floods
A warming planet is making a soggy island soggier
Why meal-replacement drinks are shaking up the British lunch
They are being rebranded as aspirational as well as efficient
The eternal Bossman
Britain’s corner shops will never die
How to get money from Ebenezer Scrooge
Get him to leave a gift in his will