Sunday shows: Tax breaks for private schools “out of step”, Phillipson says

Sophy Ridge on Sunday

Shadow Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson argued that the tax breaks enjoyed by private schools are “wrong and out of step”, she told viewers that closing schools in the heatwave should be a “last resort” and she refused comment on how much of a pay rise teachers should be given so as not to “cut across” the pay review process.

• Asked whether she supports schools closing in the heatwave: “Headteachers are usually the best people to decide what’s right in the particular circumstances of their schools… Closing schools should be a last resort.”
• She added: “What we’ve seen, however, over the last 12 years is a failure to get our schools into the best possible state to deal with these kind of problems… We’ve got a crumbling schools estate and the government has failed to invest.”
• Asked whether she backs the strike action being taken by ASLEF members: “We don’t want the strikes to go ahead. We didn’t last time and I would certainly want further strikes to be avoided.”
• Asked whether she would support teachers if they decided to go on strike: “I really hope it doesn’t come to that… The review body will be presenting to ministers what their recommendations are. I’m not going to cut across that process.”
• Asked how much a Labour government would increase teachers’ pay by: “The level of pay and the figure that you put on it is incredibly important but I know from speaking to teachers and support staff that there are bigger questions.”
• Pushed on what pay rise Labour would give: “If I were Education Secretary, I would be working with trade unions representing teachers and support staff to make sure they are properly supported both in terms of pay and in terms of workload.”
• On private schools: “We would end the tax breaks that private schools enjoy. That’s completely wrong and out of step. And put that money into making sure that all of our children in our brilliant state schools get the best possible start in life.”
• Asked which of the Conservative leadership candidates she is most worried about: “I’m not worried about any of them. I don’t think we’ve got anything to fear from any of the candidates and the reason for that is that all of them have propped up Boris Johnson and the Conservative government for 12 years now.”

ASLEF general secretary Mick Whelan discussed the strike action recently voted on by ASLEF members at eight train operating companies. He also said that Labour is doing “an awful lot of work” but that the party should “communicate it more”.

• On the planned strike action: “We’d much rather be talking to find a way out of this but unfortunately no one has come to the table.”
• Asked what pay rise the workers are looking for: “We haven’t put an exact figure on it but most people don’t understand that nobody in the rail industry has had a pay rise in three years.”
• Asked whether he would like to see a pay rise that keeps pace with inflation: “We’d like that. Standing still isn’t greed. Standing still is standing still. And of course we wouldn’t even be standing still because we’re not looking retrospectively for the pay rises we didn’t get in the previous three years.”
• On the train operators: “They’ve all been making profit throughout the pandemic and they’re making profit now – and it seems counterintuitive to us that they’re paying their shareholders and taking money out of the UK to fund state railways elsewhere while we can’t get a pay rise.”
• Put to him that the median £59,000 train driver salary is “quite a lot of money”: “I look at other workers and think that they should have what we have – but every time I ask the question if we don’t get it will you give 22% to the nurses, will give it to the fire brigades… it goes very, very quiet.”
• He added: “So we don’t enter into this politics of envy debate. For us, it’s about everybody is entitled to a pay rise, everybody should be on the standard we have.”
• Asked whether people on lower wages should be prioritised for pay rises: “Yes, and in the public sector that’s down to the government. We are actually still in the private sector.”
• On ASLEF voting to remain affiliated to the Labour Party but the “disquiet” at the direction of the party: “There’s lots of traditionalists who would like to see occasionally Labour stand with workers more regularly. We do believe it is the best game in town for working people in the UK but we have to put the offer out there. We have to show that they’ll be different.”
• Asked whether Labour is doing enough to show it is on the side of working people: “I see an awful lot of work that is done behind the scenes so I do see that there is a massive amount being done – I just think occasionally we should communicate it more.”

Dominic Raab defended Rishi Sunak’s record on the economy, telling viewers that “you can’t borrow your way out of an inflation crisis”. He also argued that he was winking at Ian Murray MP, not Angela Rayner, when he last appeared at Prime Minister’s Questions last month.

Sunday Morning

Tom Tugendhat told viewers that if he were Prime Minister, the UK would intervene if China invaded Taiwan and that the UK would not leave the European Convention on Human Rights. He also described Boris Johnson’s account of ‘partygate’ as “more fictional than reality”.

The Conservative leadership candidate also said that he supports HS2 and its extension all the way to Scotland, that he does not want to see Channel 4 privatised and that he would not grant another Scottish independence referendum.

He reiterated his support for the government’s policy of deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda for ‘processing’, arguing that it is a “totem that is necessary”. He said the policy shows “extremely clearly that Britain simply does not tolerate the human trafficking and misery of slavery and that’s why we are stopping it”.

Fellow leadership contender Penny Mordaunt also appeared on the show. She defended her plans on the economy, saying the UK “has got to get spending under control but that she would break with a fiscal rule set byt Rishi Sunak that the government will not borrow for day-to-day spending.

“We will have to do that for some time. The important thing is that our debt ratio will fall as a percentage over time,” she said.

Commenting on her claim in 2016 that the UK would not be able to prevent Turkey from joining the EU, she said the UK “didn’t have a veto” on stopping the country from joining. Pointed out that this is incorrect, Mordaunt insisted her comments were not misleading and said “we could not use that provision in the treaty”.

Asked whether people should get a diagnosis of gender dysphoria before they can legally change their gender, she said: “Yes, and if you look at the article in the Sunday Times today, that is stated very clearly.”