‘Completely out of touch with reality’: Brits are tired of rich celebrities claiming to be ‘poor’ when the rules no longer benefit them
Alexander Armstrong—a big star in the U.K.; you might recognize him as the voice of Sarah Jane’s supercomputer in the Doctor Who franchise—decided to publicly complain about the Labour government’s new VAT on private school fees. The money is supposed to go towards providing more teachers for state schools, potentially helping struggling institutions. However (and perhaps rather predictably), people who send their kids to private school seemingly do not like having that financial responsibility. But if you’re rich enough to be using a private school in the first place, there’s very little chance you can’t afford the extra cost. And if you can’t, was private school ever a truly viable option for you?
Armstrong made his comments to the Telegraph, a newspaper sometimes nicknamed the “Torygraph” because of its right-wing ideals. “I’m feeling really, really angry about [the VAT], and extremely poor,” he said. “In our case, private school is the only place available for our children to learn music.” He added, “Our 10-year-old has special educational needs. He couldn’t survive in the state system. We have chosen that, not because we’re evil, and not because we want to buy a head-start for our children, but we want them to have as good an education as we can get.”
Brits are having an absolute field day with the “extremely poor” comment. Wanting to protect your children is understandable, but Armstrong is not poor by any stretch of the imagination. He was wealthy before he started his TV career (arguably, his family’s wealth enabled him to pursue one in the first place), and he gets paid a hefty sum for presenting Pointless, one of the biggest game shows in the U.K. (It’s rumored he earns £20,000 per episode, and the show airs five days a week.) The jokes came fast.
