School vouchers for England: Harnessing choice and

competition for greater quality and equality in education

Executive summary

Background

 The Coalition government’s reforms, while well-intended, have failed to

introduce significantly greater school choice and competition and thus
cannot be expected greatly to improve overall levels of attainment in
education. This is largely due to the restrictive requirements for setting up
free schools.

 Only 174 free schools had been opened by September 2013, less than one
percent of all schools. Restrictions on school premises, interference from
local authorities and the political nature of the authorisation process have
hampered the opening of more schools.

 The present government and its successors must pursue policies designed to
increase school capacity, given the prospect of an ever-increasing population
and higher demand for school places.

What should be done

 The free school authorisation process should be simplified, and unecessary

bureaucracy associated with the present apparatus cut.

 Stipulations as to the type of school providers that may participate should be

scrapped and for-profit operators allowed to participate. This is a vital step to
attracting the level of capital investment that the necessary increases to
capacity and choice require.

 Most funding already follows pupils, but this should be expanded so that
schools are maximally incentivised to attract pupils.

 Proximity-based admissions and catchment areas should be abolished, with

oversubscribed schools allocating places through lotteries.

 In the context of the above reforms, the government should supply parents
with a voucher, redeemable at any state school and participating
independent schools.

 League tables, which tell more about pupil ability than pupil progress, should
be replaced by the release of all data regarding school performance. The
 market should decide how to use the data to help parents exercise choice
effectively.

 To prevent schools cream-skimming pupils that are more likely to do well,

schools, state and participating independent schools alike, should not be able
to accept or reject pupils on the basis of ability or background.

 The National Funding Formula announced in 2013 should be seen as an

opportunity for the government to improve differentiation of funding for
schools.

 In future, building on the principle behind the Pupil Premium, funding should
be differentiated further to take account of the differing costs associated
with educating low attaining pupils from a variety of different socio-economic
backgrounds, so incentivising providers to specialise and target areas with
high levels of under-achievement.

 Exisiting independent schools should be allowed to accept voucher pupils,

provided they commit in advance to the number of places to be made
available, discontinue selective entry practices for the pupils concerned, and
allocate places through lotteries in the case of over-subscription. These
schools would be likely to be incentivised to participate by the prospect of a
more steady income from government.

 Because of the potentially distorting effect they might have on the

programme, pressure to permit top-ups fees should be resisted. These could,
however, be trialled at a later date, as they may have economic advantages
and their segregating effects could foreseeably be limited by careful design.

 A tax credit system, which gives parents tax rebates for opting for fee-
charging independent schools, is deemed to be an inferior alternative for four
reasons:
1. Fee-charging independent schools do not consistently outperform
state schools and thus shouldn’t be privileged as providers.
2. Tax credits only benefit those who have upfront access to funding for
fees; bursary and charity support schemes do not guarantee funding.
3. Inadequate and inaccessible information for low educated parents
results in tax credit schemes not being consistently taken up by
disadvantaged groups.
4. The complex nature of tax systems makes it difficult to issue tax
credits. It is unclear at what point and against which bill credits should
be issued. Too often, such schemes result in the addition of complex
layers of bureaucracy.