Proposal that Independent school pupils should pay extra Uni fees

But there are very few counties which still have grammar schools (my county, Oxfordshire, certainly doesn't have any) and there are no serious proposals to restore them. I agree with not making anyone take the 11+, that is what happens where there are still grammars.

In a perfect world, yes.

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You have grammars to the left of you, to the right of you, above you and below you.

ie. there are grammars in Gloucestershire, Buckinghamshire, Warwickshire and Berkshire.

Why is the state sector a 'punishment'??? Without the disadvantages which comprehensives face from other competing schools in the area which cream off the best students and staff they would probably do better. And how are state schools 'strained'? I know plenty which can't fill all their places.

No, it's up to the parents where they send their children.

Well I have news for you hildabeast, we don't live in a perfect world, so we have to deal with it.

It should be up to the child, the parents should get little say. It annoys me when people go 'My mother wont let me go to that school' - a little off the topic

You have grammars to the left of you, to the right of you, above you and below you.

ie. there are grammars in Gloucestershire, Buckinghamshire, Warwickshire and Berkshire.

Parents are legally responsible for their child.

Yes we live in a country with a stupid class system and elitism.

Yep, but living in the middle of Oxfordshire this would mean impractical/impossible travelling, and do they even take pupils who live beyond a certain distance away from the school?

And idiots too.

I agree and I'm not one if that is what you were suggesting

Marxist

You have silly little counties down south, nothing like up here, I should imagine it would only be a short distance.

Most grammars take a quota out of their catchment area and I imagine some grammar's catchment areas would actually fall in Oxfordshire.

Sorry?

You display the attributes of a Marxist, as in, one who follows the beliefs of Karl Marx about social structure etc. Read "The Communist Manifesto".

But, as you admit, these are extreme examples and it won't just be Westminster students paying this extra money, it will be parents who send their children to much less expensive private schools who are probably not a lot wealthier than the state school parents.

But surely these parents really deserve a financial break after having to spend £10k a year on school fees, and should be able to spend money on themselves rather than their children once they're off to uni.

No-one forces these parents to put their children in fee-paying schools though, do they?