After private-school tax raid Eton tells dad and mom: We cannot afford to drop our £63,000-a-year charges

The new Provost of Eton College has admitted the historic school has faced multiple calls from parents to lower fees since it told them it was levying Labour’s full ‘private-school tax’ on them.

Eton is one of the few leading public schools to pass the full burden of Labour’s controversial 20 per cent VAT raid on fees onto parents.

Sir Nicholas Coleridge said the school, famously attended by Princes William and Harry, could not afford to absorb any of the cost because it had so many financial commitments.

In a lengthy letter to parents, Sir Nicholas – himself an Old Etonian – revealed he had been asked why one of the UK’s richest schools, which is sitting on a cash reserve of £553 million, couldn’t afford to drop fees in the face of the VAT raid.

Sir Nicholas, the former president of Vogue publisher Condé Nast International, defended the school’s decision and said it had ‘no latitude to reduce the VAT itself’.

He said the college was now facing an additional bill of around £1 million from the Budget rise in employers’ National Insurance, as well as a bill for £1 million in lost business-rate relief. 

Eton, pictured, is one of the few leading public schools to pass the full burden of Labour’s controversial 20 per cent VAT raid on fees onto parents

Sir Nicholas Coleridge, pictured, said the school, famously attended by Princes William and Harry, could not afford to absorb any of the cost because it had so many financial commitments

And he told them that ‘drawdown’ from the college’s ‘large endowment’ was already earmarked for paying for scholarships and bursaries and the upkeep of the college’s buildings and art collection, as well as for the state schools it supported.

He admitted Eton had already been deluged with requests from current parents for help with the VAT payment, which will see the school’s fees skyrocket from £52,749 a year to an eye-watering £63,299 a year from January.

He said ‘over a hundred families’ – around one in ten of Eton’s 1,300 pupils – were being ‘means tested’ for bursary support, adding ‘we have already agreed to assist with a good many of them’.

The former media chief, who took over the prestigious role in September, added: ‘Eton spends more on your sons’ education than we receive in school fees.’

Meanwhile, rival Harrow has told parents it will charge only 15 per cent extra, while another major public school, Stowe, will charge parents an additional 14 per cent in a bid to cushion the blow.