United Kingdom government forced two private schools to do charity work after a watchdog complained about inactivity in charity work. The Labor Commission cites private schools must provide free education to 20 poorer students of U.K. The order was based on the 2006 Labor law that charity work must provide public benefit assessed by the Charity Commission. As reported on the Daily Mail UK, the charity commission pressed for the move in return for the schools to keep their charitable status and the tax breaks that come with it.

St. Anselm’s Preparatory School in Bakewell and Highfield Priory in Lacanshire were discovered to yield from its charitable obligations. The commission also pointed that since the charity act had took its effect on 2006, the two preparatory schools had failed to offer subsidized places for families compared to numerous independent schools. In defense with the commission’s expectations, David Lyscom of the Independent Schools Council said: “This decision does little to lift the uncertainty for charitable schools about what they need to do to meet the commission’s public benefit test. Nor does it resolve our concern all along that the commission’s interpretation of public benefit is too narrow and deeply flawed”.

In addition, the head teacher of St. Anselm’s pointed out the numerous problems faced by the school, from its difficult rural location, the issue of child protection concerning the juvenility of the students and the school has no donations. She believes this could complicate the situation especially in this economically hard time to add more subsidies and places. Labor critics condemned such regulation saying that providing education itself is a public benefit and providing places would mean increasing tuition fees of the private schools.