“There is no alternative state sector provision that would meet their needs,” they said.
Noting also that the Charedi community faced “severe antisemitic abuse and risks to their personal security,” they said one of the Jewish children in the case had experienced abuse in the street and her Jewish school had been targeted in two antisemitic attacks.
Charedi children, as “visibly Jewish”, were likely to face antisemitism and discrimination in non-Charedi schools, “endangering their safety and emotional wellbeing,” they observed.
But an increase in fees would put “a huge strain on her families” and could case her “to be withdrawn” from her school.
The lawyers also pointed out that it was impractical for many Charedi independent schools to try to convert to the state sector because aspects of the curriculum were “incompatible with their religious values”.
In reports to the Treasury, Government officials had acknowledged that “faith schools that serve narrow religious communities are generally smaller schools with lower fees on average than other independent schools.” Such schools were “more at risk of insolvency,” officials said.
According to Chinuch UK, the Charedi educational umbrella group, strictly Orthodox schools were already experiencing “severe financial fragility”.
Chinuch UK and Partnership for Jewish Schools (PaJes) had proposed exemption from VAT for small schools that charged less than the annual cost of education a child in state education which was £7,690.
This would have exempted around 150 small schools (there are around 65 Charedi independent schools in all, which charge an average of £2,231 a year according to Chinuch UK). The exemption would have represented around £10 million to £30 million, according to Treasury estimates, the equivalent of less than two per cent of the revenue it hoped to raise from taxing independent schools.
The Treasury had argued that exceptions were “administratively unworkable” but this was a “weak answer”, the lawyers said.
The exemption proposal was realistic, rational and inexpensive, they said.
