It’s easy for a Finn to get a bit queasy when people start discussing the price of education. After all, we’ve got free compulsory schooling and what’s more, we’ve got free universities. But the poor Britons have to pay for their own (well, more often for their children’s) education.

And oh boy, it can get costly. I’d never even realized that the cost of putting someone through university is quite minimal compared to what has happened before that. An article in today’s Independent puts the total cost of a private education at £188,000. Of that only £15,000 goes into university. Pre-prep costs £24,000 (3 to 7 years), prep school £54,000 (7 to 13 years) and secondary school £95,000 (13 to 18 years).

It’s no wonder that the class structuress are more rigid here than in Finland.The number of people in private schools is around 7 percent of the population, or more than 500,000 pupils, and after all you would expect to get something substantial in return for spending a whopping 200k on your brat’s education.

On a lighter note, have you read about the cat who inherited a house and £100,000? What a lucky pussy.