I agree that the proposal is ludicrous, but just to throw a spanner in the works...
'It turns out that maintained schools are
just as expensive as private ones. School fees in the private sector have
shot up; but so has the state education budget, reaching £77.7 billion last year. Divide that by the number of pupils in the system and it works out as more than £9,000 per head. The average cost of an independent day school? £9,069.'
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/da...ependent_ones/
Sixty nine quid isn't a lot of difference over a year, and if because of the recession there's a massive increase for places in state schools, the cost of those pupil's education will have to be funded by the tax payer.
What's more of a concern to me is that private schools are classed as charities, and benefit as such when it comes to being taxed. Although the government is currently taking steps to make sure private schools do benefit the wider community by giving a relatively high number of scholarships. Those schools who don't, will quite rightly lose their charitable status, and tax benefits.