The problem is government just never does stop spending, does it?

If there are fewer children then we require fewer schools, right?

Failing schools with tumbling pupil numbers will be “propped up” by the taxpayer under plans to hand them extra cash to stay open.

Har, har har, no, don’t be silly. That’s not the way it works in the slightest. If we require less schooling to take place then what government is going to do is subsidise schooling more. This would of course be one of the advantages of moving to a pure voucher system, as in Sweden. Government expenditure upon schools will be defined and limited by the number of children who need schooling.

But there’s also that larger issue to consider. Which is that the really grand difference between capitalism ‘n’ markets and government is that the capitalism ‘n’ markets system has within it its own culling system. It operates naturally, without requiring any positive action. If something is no longer worth doing - that is, the resources to do it cost more than the benefit that can be captured from doing it - then the people doing that thing go bust and are removed from the system. They also stop wasting resources on those things no longer worth doing.

This is not true of railway systems when run by government - vide HS2. It’s not true of blast furnaces when there’s even a sniff of subsidy available. Simply because we do recycle much more steel these days we require fewer blast furnaces. Is that actually happening? Nope, not here it isn’t, everyone’s standing around with their hands out instead.

If we require fewer schools because there are fewer children who need educating then we should close schools. Is that what government’s doing? No - which is the argument against government running schools, isn’t it.