I send my children to private school and I’m terrified by Corbyn’s manifesto

The Labour manifesto launched by Jeremy Corbyn has serious flaws and is contradictory to what he says. It leaves me horrified and scared.

My husband and I work very hard to be able to send our children to a private faith school. Corbyn wants to integrate private schools into the state sector and redistribute the funds and properties to other schools. Yet he has repeatedly stated: “I am determined that our society is safe for people of all faiths.” How can it be safe if we are denied the basic right of sending our children to the school of our choice, just because of our faith?

The manifesto also wants to scrap the married couple’s allowance, so I would end up worse off, therefore leaving me with less money to put towards private school fees.

Has Corbyn also considered that if private schools lose tax breaks and have to pay VAT, many would be forced to close? This would ultimately cost the government more as more students would enter the state school system. Closing private schools would not improve the public schools. Our private education system in this country attracts students from around the world, which is good for the economy, so we would in effect be throwing this away too!

A study earlier this year found that privately educated children can get up to two grades higher at A-levels than their public school peers. Do we want to continue to produce results that encourage students from around the world to come and invest in an education in our country?

As for scrapping Ofsted! It provides a recognised national standard that all schools, state and private, are ranked by. Many parents choose their child’s school according to the Ofsted rating. If schools are to be inspected by local authorities, how can we be sure that there is a consistency between different areas of the country?

Corbyn has said “I don’t want anyone to be feeling insecure in our society and our government will protect every community”, what about the private school community?

Lorna Sewell​
Healing, Lincolnshire

The funding crisis in our schools is a scandal

One of my big concerns is the level of cuts to school funding and the terrible impact that this will have on our young people and their future education.

Schoolteachers and support staff do a fantastic job but it’s really important that they have the resources and support they desperately need.

I was shocked to find that an estimated 16,523 schools across England will be worse off next year than they were in 2015.

This isn’t good enough. Britain is one of the richest countries on earth. We should be able to fund our children’s schools properly.

The only way we can win adequate funding for our schools is to make an informed vote for education on 12 December, based on the facts.

Readers should visit the website: schoolcuts.org.uk to find out the impact on your school and see which candidates have pledged to stop school cuts.

Andrea Gilbert
London SW1

‘Honoured’ police officer’s downfall

I find the prosecution of this otherwise admirable woman quite astonishing.

The prosecution of a dedicated professional who had no illegal or unsocial intent is quite extraordinary and inexplicable to me. She is an admirable role model for women and a community poorly represented generally. I cannot believe that similar treatment would be result if her background was different. I’m appalled.

As a clinician who has spent a career in paediatrics and hence child protection, I can see absolutely no reason why Robyn Williams’ entire professional career should be jeopardised and why a more nuanced, common sense, approach is not applied.

Daphne Keen
London SW8

Corbyn, please apologise

Jeremy Corbyn says he wants every faith and walk of life to feel protected and safe. He was given the chance to apologise for his antisemitic ways four times in his interview with the BBC’s Andrew Neil and every time he declined.

As a practising Christian myself, how can I and other Christians trust what Jeremy Corbyn says? I don’t think we want this man running our country.

Alice L
Cardiff

Corbyn, please don’t apologise

It is simply false to assert that Corbyn “refused to apologise” for antisemitism in his party. Rather, he ignored a bullying demand for an apology for something for which he has no reason to apologise.

Corbyn thankfully has the nous to spot a propagandist elephant-trap when he sees one, and to simply ignore it – and he was absolutely right not to allow himself to be positioned into apologising by a grandstanding Andrew Neil, whose sole purpose was to create his own newsline that would then generate a storm that would consume Corbyn.

Mr Learmont-Hughes appears not to be aware of the new book by reputable academic researchers, Bad News for Labour: Antisemitism, the Party and Public Belief (Greg Philo et al., Pluto, 2019), which provides chapter-and-verse on the orchestrated establishment assault on Labour and Corbyn around antisemitism. He might also be surprised to hear that since 1977, there are at least 50 instances of Corbyn having proactively supported challenges to antisemitism and having supported Jewish causes, Of course the critics can’t acknowledge the latter, as it would fatally disrupt their Corbyn-beating narrative.

The chief rabbi is merely the latest weapon to be deployed by the “Destroy Corbyn By Any Means” Project; and the BBC’s wall-to-wall reporting of this non-story in particular has been an outrage, and in flagrant contravention of their legal responsibility for neutral political reporting in general election campaigns.

Dr Richard House
Stroud, Gloucestershire

A threat to us all?

Steve Bannon proposes to open a branch of the international far-right franchise here in Britain. Bannon’s candidate, Boris Johnson, is endorsed by the local far-right.

The historic enemy is advancing and Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party is the only force capable of beating them at the ballot box. Please vote wisely.

Emma Jones
Abingdon, Oxfordshire

Regarding your piece on the cops asking someone to take down their “Bollocks to Brexit” sign, it reminds me of a similar slogan in the window of an ordinary terraced house in Ypres, Belgium, which we spotted on a November evening near the Menin Gate.

It gave us much happiness.

We were visiting from Brussels and it confirms what I love about my adopted country, Belgium!

Name and address supplied

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