You’re right Paul - the terms not-for-profit and ‘non-profits’ (applied to organisations) have clear meanings in American tax law, but not in the UK context - although they are widely used.
The concept of charity in English law (and I do mean English - it’s actually different in Scotland even!) is very tricky, because it’s in effect overseen by 2 parts of the government - the Charity Commission and HMRC - which don’t always see it the same way. It is possible to be denied charity status (known as registered charity status) by the Commission but still obtain tax charity status from HMRC (known as exempt charity status). Then there are asset-locked bodies (Community Benefit Societies and Community Interest Companies) that might or might not get exempt charity status, and might or might not get business rate relief, etc!
Designing optimal organisational structures for UK clients (and they include Oxfam, RNIB, the NHS, etc) around such considerations has been a big part of my work for literally decades - but I realise I’ve probably just bored everybody reading this here to tears!
A well-rounded education is surely most parents’ dream.
Sadly the school I spoke about sought to stifle/demoralise those children who were capable of achieving - and that is not a good thing in my book.
A well rounded woman is my dream !
Basically labour are unelectable, with the tosh they come out with. Last week letting tennents buy private rented property below market value.
Nationalise everything they can.
4 day working week for the same money.
More bank holidays.
They suggest anything just to get votes.
But as Blair did, give the unemployed, the students, more money and you get votes. But it nearly bankrupted the country and a major cause fir the 2008 crash. Sovereign debt crisis, before you all blame the banks.
Are you also suggesting austerity came about because there were too many public libraries in Wolverhampton?
Welcome back, Marijke! 
Thanks Peter! Nice to be back 
So (more) tax breaks for the richest are the way forward then…
Yeah, that would work
I confess that I do not understand Labour at the moment. They seem to have no comprehension that the reason they lost against May was Corbyn and the reason they will probably lose against Johnson is … Corbyn.
Which is a pretty sad indictment against the most useless, corrupt government in living memory.
Take the private schools policy - it’s very worthy isn’t it, but whose vote will it win? Anyone who thinks this is a really good idea is already a Labour voter.
But there will be a good few Labour voters who will think it is an abysmal idea (or should) - the number of Labour MPs who were educated privately or (more importantly) sent their own children to be educated privately is legion.
In short this will win no converts.
Right to buy from private landlords? - very worthy but it’s not going to get the landlords’ votes and the tenants probably already hold party membership cards.
Free prescriptions? Great but preaching to the choir (and will fuel the biggest problem with the NHS which is that it is free at the point of (ab)use).
It’s almost as if they do not actually want power but want to be the plucky loser.
The Brexit position is the most destructive - no position at all.
At least they now promise a referendum and “a deal”. That’s kind-of OK for Labour Remainers, despite recently joining the LibDems I do not agree with Swinson’s comments that the Labour offer of a referendum “bretrays” the Remain voteer (and see this Guardian piece for why this is counterproductive) - but it is not a more attractive position for a Remain voter than the LibDems who have come out fully for revocation.
But what of Labour Leavers - they are being asked to buy a pig in a poke, their vote will lean towards Farage who is apparently offering a simple, clean, deal - or lack thereof. The fact that it is neither simple nor clean will not matter to them.
Who is left - their policies will drive away the moderate vote and/or win no new voters.
It’s not a big step for a moderate Labour Remain voter to decide that Labour can’t get in so why not pitch in with the LibDems?
Labour are sunk.
All ideas are ideological. Your ideas are ideological, the content, as they say, is on the tin! 
Could someone please explain how abolishing private schools improves the standard of education available to the 93% of children who attend state schools?
It doesn’t.
In fact, with no new funds, it worsens it.
Brilliant Paul 
I missed the labour proposal on right to buy for some reason but having now read up on it I cannot get my breath.
The suggestion that landlords who do not maintain thier properties would give the tenant the right to buy!!
The tenants that tend to occupy such properties have thier rent paid for by benefits so in reality the government would be buying them.
Please don’t get me going on this subject as being a landlord whose current tenancies range from 2 to 10 years then with the tenant discount that would command I might as well give my properties away.
As Paul says these crazy Labour ideas are not vote winners they are simply adding to thier already dwindling voter base.
Bring on a lib dem government
Well Labour are certainly setting out a bold stall. I am in no way suggesting it will win them any elections in the UK. However I need to reiterate my previous point that many of the problems we have are down to our education system. Both Cameron and Johnson are excellent examples of the overprivileged being promoted above their level of competence and just look where that has got us!
I have found these two articles very interesting:
I think something approaching the Finnish model is the way forwards. Doing away with standardised tests will enable a focus on real learning. Part of learning is also making mistakes and real learning only happens when pupils are allowed to do so and learn from these.
This does not mean I don’t believe in a differentiated education system. All students need to be supported to perform at the best of their abilities. The one size fits all approach (Something closer to the French system) means that a significant number of pupils will struggle.
Fundamentally the UK also needs to offer much better vocational education tailored to the needs of this century.
Instead we currently have a state system where by and large accountability has gone mad and a desperate focus on league tables lets everyone down. It is also manifestly unfair that some private school pupils sit the easier igcse exams.
But we can also look at it another way, how much more enjoyable would a lot of children’s childhoods be if they were not tutored to within an inch of their lives for 11+ exams. There are some fantastic private schools and I don’t deny they can offer a wonderful education but I think another system is possible.
A fusion of the private and public education sector could be a very positive thing. This is why I think, as with all big decisions, it would benefit from cross-party collaboration. Next stop: proportional representation! 
The problem lies in the uncontested fact that private school education is at the heart of a corrupt cronyism that distorts access to elite universities and the upper echelons of crucial professions such as politics, the law and upper levels of the armed services, in favour of “good chaps”, a privileged minority.
Not all private and public school alumni reach dizzy heights, but a wholly disproportionate number do. It is not because they are better than their state educated peers, cleverer or more able.
They are just privileged by a veneer of “born to rule” complacency, because they know they can not be toppled, the dice is always loaded in their favour, and that “their sort” have history on their side.
Minor private schools with their made-up heraldic crests and nineteenth century replica tunics and blazers are a cruel deception perpetrated on credible would-be social climbers who will scramble gratefully for the crumbs of favour tossed down from the aristocratic table.
It’s time this grotesque charade of bogus courtliness was swept away, IMO, and the monarchy with it.
There is also the case however that they may have had a very good education and been in an environment where success is not only encouraged but expected along with a great deal of competitive sport bringing a winning team mentality.
When combined with improving social skills whereby children are very comfortable having an interesting discussion with adults.
The list goes on - so perhaps not just the old boys clubs but perhaps the source of a disproportionately high number of well rounded confident individuals?
Is there anything to stop state schools trying to achieve the same aims if it would appear to be a successful model other than adequate funding?
Mat, any kind of service that has at its heart a carefully assessed, targetted and personalised professional service such as you describe in your private school has to be very well resourced.
Neither sporting achievement, intensive emergency health care, breeding animals nor the tutelage of our children can be done on the cheap. Like factory farming, garbage in garbage out.
To instal and maintain the teacher-pupil ratios that obtain in public schools, the number of teachers in state schools would have to be tripled, and the sporting and cultural amenities (and teachers’ conditions of service) vastly improved.
That would cost money, and the school budgets have been drastically cut.
On top of that is the heavy hand of top-down managerialism by Government who think of education as a saleable commodity, not a thread in the social fabric, and of children as “cogs in the wheel” or “just another brick in the wall” (Remember that, early 1980s, “Teacher, leave us kids alone!”?).
It was never intended to be that.
The so called Tripartite sytem of education of which I am a product of the 1950’s and 60’s education system never intended the 11 plus to be a pass/fail exam but a “funnelling” system directing kids towards assessing their suitability for various types of education. It only ever became a binary choice when some education authorities did not fully adopt the tripartite system the Conservative MP Rab Butler intended in the 1944 Education Act despite its favour with many in the Labour Party (how things have changed eh?).
Very few technical schools were opened, due to the lack of money and a shortage of suitably qualified teachers. This failure to develop the technical part of the system undermined the whole structure. The tripartite system was, in effect, a two-tier system with grammar schools for the academically gifted and secondary modern schools for the others.
I was fortunate in that Manchester, there were many new housing areas being built - Wythenshawe being one such fast growing area with - to boot - a new Hospital and a very forward thinking Technical High school in two parts on one site (opposite the old Timson Shoe Factory) one part for girls and the other for boys each with its own Head Teacher and infra-structure but common areas such as the playing field and bus park. The schools were combined in to one Comprehensive school at the beginning of the school term after I left (maybe I broke the system 
) and thus ended an era. The rest, they say, is history.
Peter, it is quite clear from your comments that you do not approve of private education however I find your comments misguided and ill informed.
To suggest that minor public schools formed in the 19th century are a haven for social climbers is rubbish. There will always be elitism when money can buy education but very much in the minority.
Our children’s public school was founded in the 19th century by the very same person that set the model that is today your old age pension.
The Duke of Devonshire created a pension and education system and even a hospital for his employees and families and fought in parliament to establish pensions for all.
He gave the land on which the public school uor children attended still stands and he and other local aristocracy have supported its existence ever since.
Such people were true statesman who ,yes, came from a privileged background but used there influence for the greater good of the population, unlike those currently in power who we read about every day.
I cannot agree with your comments and IMO is a view of someone on the outside looking in whereas I have been on both the outside and inside.