DCH 141 St Augustine's Priory
Comments on the Draft Charities
Bill 2004
Introduction
1 We welcome this opportunity to comment
on the draft Charities Bill, and hope that our comments will be
helpful. As an independent school, we believe that we play -
and can continue to play - a significant role in the education
system as a whole, not so much because of the fact of independence,
but because of the School's inclusiveness in the local community,
which we deal with in more detail below.
2 St Augustine's Priory was founded
in France in 1634 by English nuns who had fled this country.
The School's first pupil was a girl named Margaret Dormer, and
she went on to become a member of the Order herself. The School
flourished and grew, surviving the French Revolution, the revolutions
of 1830 and 1848, and the war of 1870. However, French anti-clerical
laws enacted in the early years of the last century forced the
nuns to leave France, and they came to Ealing in 1910. The School
was re-established, first in a site near the Abbey of St Benedict's,
and on this site in 1915. The nuns continued to teach in the
School until the early 1990s, when age and growing ill-health
brought about a gradual withdrawal. A lay Headmistress - the
first ever - was appointed in 1995. Since then, the School roll
has increased to about 500 pupils.
Inclusiveness of the School
3 Although the School was founded by
Catholic nuns, and has retained its Catholic identity and ethos,
it has from a very early stage welcomed pupils not only from many
different national backgrounds, but has also welcomed pupils brought
up in different religious traditions. At the time of writing,
while a majority of pupils are Catholic, there are many pupils
from other Christian denominations, and from Sikh, Hindu, Muslim,
Jewish, Buddhist, Jain, Shinto and Zoroastrian backgrounds. Pupils
are encouraged to celebrate this degree of diversity, which is
also reflected in the national backgrounds of our pupils, with
pupils from virtually every country in Europe, and from almost
every continent.
4 We feel, therefore, that the School
represents a practical and working example of a thriving and dynamic
community with a rich ethnic and religious mix. We feel, too,
that this is worth keeping and celebrating.
5 An important factor in keeping this
rich and rewarding mix of religions, cultures and ethnic backgrounds
is that the School has, traditionally, kept its fees lower than
most other independent schools in this part of London. At present,
our fees per term range from £1,690 for our Preps to £2,375
for our Seniors. On average, this is about £400 to £600
per term lower than other independent schools in the area. The
School is determined to keep its fees as low as possible so that
the School will continue to be accessible to pupils from a wide
range of backgrounds.
6 In addition, the School makes every
effort to accommodate pupils from families which would find it
difficult to pay fees. Scholarships and bursaries in the School's
last accounting year (to 31 July 2003) amounted to £214,000
(fees actually charged amounted to about £2.7 million), and
to £212,000 the year before. At the same time, it should
be made clear that the School is almost totally dependent on its
fee income for its future survival, and the economic status of
most parents (the Headmistress estimates that more than 50% of
pupils come from families in which both parents have to work in
order to support themselves and their children) is such that the
School would not expect, in an average year, to be able to raise
more than £15,000 - £20,000 through fund-raising from
the parent body.
Areas of Concern
7 We believe that we make a useful,
constructive contribution, educationally and socially, to a sizeable
proportion of our local community, but this would be threatened
to a significant extent if our charitable status were to be affected
by future legislation. As noted above, the School is almost totally
dependent on its fee income, and if this were to become subject
to tax the School, in order to continue to operate, would probably
have to increase its fee levels in order to ensure that (roughly)
its post-tax surplus then would be the same as its untaxed surplus
now. This would, of necessity, tend to exclude the very pupils
that we do include now and wish to be able to include in the future.
8 We understand from the Charity Commission
that it is not, in fact, the intention that existing charities
would lose their charitable status as a result of the legislation
that will flow from the draft bill, but we would welcome further
assurance on this.
9 Our other particular area of concern
is that any "public benefit" test should have regard
to the resources and scope of the institution to which such a
test might be applied. In other words, we do not see how it could
be fair or appropriate for legislation to embody some sort of
absolute test under this head.
10 In the case of St Augustine's, for
example, the resources we have on site are probably less extensive
than in most maintained schools. We have no school hall large
enough to accommodate the whole School population, we have no
large gymnasium (our hall, such as it is, does duty as the gymnasium,
theatre and examination room), no swimming pool, no fully equipped
art room, no properly equipped changing rooms for games and PE,
and no properly equipped School library. Our only significant
outdoor resource, an all-weather games pitch, is now more than
15 years old and, because of wear and tear, would not stand up
to much more use than it currently gets from our own pupils, which
would make it difficult to "loan" to other schools.
11 We are sure that there are other
independent schools, especially smaller independent schools, that
are in a position similar to ours - with limited resources, trying
to manage on a fairly tight (and modest) budget.
12 At the same time, however, we do
make resources at the School available to a number of groups in
our local community. Our Parish Church uses classrooms for preparation
classes for communion and confirmation; a local music group uses
our music practice rooms and Music Room for its examinations;
the Polish community has used our grounds for outdoor processions
and celebrations, and members of the local community have also
used our Chapel for baptisms and weddings. At present, with the
resources available, and given the constant concern about security,
we feel we are doing about as much as we can do in the way of
involving the School in the wider community.
Conclusion
13 All in all, we feel that the School
performs well and usefully, not only as a part of the Catholic
community in West London - all the more important, perhaps, because
of the disappearance of so many other Catholic schools, maintained
and independent, in the last 25 years or so - but as part of the
wider community, with a rich and stimulating mix of pupils attending
the School. We would welcome many of the developments that are
touched on in the draft bill, such as the extension of the powers
for the Charity Commission to give appropriate advice and guidance.
Our main concern is that the legislation to flow from the draft
bill should not strip the School of its existing charitable status,
or impose an unreasonable public benefit test. Loss of charitable
status would probably not force the School to close, but would
force it to become far less inclusive than it is. That is something
we would like to avoid.
14 We hope that members of the Parliamentary
Scrutiny Committee will feel that this short commentary is helpful.
As we have said, we believe that many other small independent
schools would make the same or similar points. If you require
further information, or would like to have copies of School accounts,
please let us know.
18.06.04
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