Times Online - Britain

Times Online - Britain: "Private schools get tax boost
By Alexandra Frean, Social Affairs Correspondent, and Tony Halpin, Education Editor

PRIVATE schools and hospitals will today escape the crackdown they had feared on their �100 million tax breaks when ministers publish the long-awaited Charity Bill.
The Bill will stop short of automatically stripping elite schools such as Eton and Harrow of their charitable status or of demanding that they throw their doors open to the wider public, The Times understands.

Independent hospitals such as the Nuffield group will also continue to enjoy their tax benefits at the discretion of the Charity Commission. Many fee-paying schools had feared that the first major reform of charity law for 400 years might be used to please Labour activists opposed to their elite status, particularly with a general election so near. "