HC Deb 15 January 1980 vol 976 cc1415-6
6. Mr. Foulkes

asked the Secretary of State for Defence if he will list the amount of any fees paid by the Government to private, direct-grant and grant-aided schools in the United Kingdom on behalf of British Service men, for each school.

Mr. Hayhoe

No, Sir. A Service man who places his child in a boarding school to ensure continuity of education may claim a boarding school allowance, but it remains his own responsibility to pay the fee to the school he has selected. In certain circumstances, he may arrange for a sum due to him to be remitted direct to a school by the Service paymaster, but information as to the amounts or schools covered by any such payments is not readily available.

Mr. Foulkes

Would it not be more appropriate for the Ministry to arrange for public money to be used to provide much-needed additional boarding places at State schools instead of using public money to continue further to subsidise the élite private sector?

Mr. Hayhoe

The scheme under which this money is available has been running for many years. It is absolutely in the interests of those who are eligible to take part in it. I am sure it is right that the scheme should be continued.

Mr. Cyril D. Townsend

Will my right hon. Friend look at the scheme operated by the Foreign Office which is in many ways superior to the scheme operated by the Ministry of Defence? Why should the children of diplomats be treated in a superior fashion to the children of soldiers?

Mr. Hayhoe

I shall look into that matter. The boarding school allowances have been increased from September last year. Inequality of treatment relating to this and other matters is looked at all the time.

Mr. Flannery

Is it not the fact that under the new Education Bill, £60 million will be given to private schools? Is it not, therefore, more necessary than ever that we know what other moneys are going to private schools? Why will the Minister not let us know? Figures given recently in the press are as high as hundreds of millions of pounds. We have a right to know how much public money is going to private education, even under the heading of defence.

Mr. Hayhoe

The amount of money involved in these matters is known. If the hon. Gentleman follows Hansard, he will see that I answered a question on this matter tabled by one of his hon. Friends on 26 July last year.