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Dear Friend,
In the newsletter this week
* An influx of Venezuela misinformation
* A new threat to scientific publishing
* Has unemployment risen ‘every single month’ under Labour?
* Government Tracker
* More fact checks...
But first...
We look ahead to Full Fact’s priorities in 2026, which is a year of Scottish and Welsh parliament elections and local elections in England.
Full Fact will focus intensely on fact checking with an aim to maintain public trust in election integrity so that voters can ask the right questions, understand narrative context, and make informed democratic choices.
For example, in 2025, we fact checked dozens of videos making outlandish claims about new government policies, including time limits for sitting on park benches ([link removed]) , caps on the number of flights ([link removed]) , and monitoring of phone calls ([link removed]) . Despite being weapons-grade nonsense, similarly misleading videos we recently analysed were viewed more than 8.4 million times.
Read our analysis ([link removed])
Mark Frankel, Head of Public Affairs, set out some of Full Fact’s priorities for 2026 and you can watch the video on our social media channels.
Watch on YouTube ([link removed]) Watch on Facebook ([link removed])
Best wishes,
Jon
Full Fact
More fact checks from this week ↓
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** An influx of Venezuela misinformation ([link removed])
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[link removed]
After Nicolás Maduro’s seizure by US forces on 3 January 2026, a slurry of misinformation has spread across social media platforms attracting millions of views.
Claims we have checked include repurposed video from Israel and AI-generated content of Westminster. Collectively this sort of misinformation can misrepresent the unfolding story and may erode trust in genuine verifiable information. For tips on how to verify content before you share it, read our toolkit ([link removed]) .
Read fact checks on Venezuela ([link removed])
** A new threat to scientific publishing ([link removed])
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[link removed]
Guest author Dorothy V M Bishop, Emeritus Professor of Developmental Neuropsychology University of Oxford takes a look at paper mills: organisations that sell authorship for fraudulent or low-value articles that are flooding journals and undermining trust in research integrity.
Read the comment piece ([link removed])
** Support Full Fact
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** As a registered charity, Full Fact relies on the public to support our independent, impartial fact checking and advocacy work. Monthly donations help challenge harmful misinformation from politicians, in the media, and online.
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** Please support Full Fact with a monthly gift of £10
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Remind me next week ([link removed])
** Has unemployment risen ‘every single month’ under Labour? ([link removed])
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By: Hannah Smith ([link removed])
Conservative shadow chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and shadow Northern Ireland secretary Alex Burghart claimed on LBC this week that unemployment has risen “in every single month” since Labour took office. This isn’t quite right.
Read the fact check → ([link removed])
We’ve written in more detail about how unemployment is measured in our explainer ([link removed]) , which also features the latest figures.
** Government Tracker
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A selection of updates from the last seven days.
** Thursday 8 January
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Is the government on course to create three new National Forests in England? ([link removed])
** Tuesday 6 January
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Is the government on course to remove hereditary peers from the House of Lords? ([link removed]) Is the government on course to introduce a mandatory retirement age for members of the House of Lords? ([link removed])
** Monday 5 January
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Has the government stopped using hotels to house asylum seekers? ([link removed])
** More fact checks...
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** Fake planning notice falsely claims application lodged for Stockport asylum seeker housing ([link removed])
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By: Charlotte Green ([link removed])
** How many households have cancelled the BBC TV licence fee since 2020? ([link removed])
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By: Sian Bayley ([link removed])
** Fake ‘BBC’ article falsely claims that Martin Lewis has been arrested ([link removed])
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By: Sian Bayley ([link removed])
Get even more facts... ([link removed])
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