20 December 2019 | Have yourself a factful little Christmas
Bad information can harm our lives and communities. Don't let it ruin your Christmas dinners too.

Below, you’ll find a list of fact checks on some of this year’s hotly debated topics—so that if you're celebrating the day with your nearest and dearest, bad information won’t get anywhere near the cranberry sauce.

The election

Whether you like it or not, the ‘e’ word might be an unavoidable dinner table topic. This three minute video debunks six of the biggest claims from the two big parties.

Unfounded rumours brewed online as well as offline. There is no evidence to suggest the photo of a boy sleeping on a hospital floor was staged. The BBC didn't “donate” money to the Conservative party either. 

Facebook ads were another hot talking point of the campaign. We compared Labour and the Conservative Party's online strategies.

And in case you missed it, we answered your most frequently asked questions about the campaign.

NHS

We’ve seen a lot of information circulating about the NHS this year. A number of you asked us whether the NHS is, or will ever be, privatised (tdlr: depending on how you count it, 7%-22% of the NHS is already outsourced to private providers).

Poverty

Throughout the election we heard various claims that poverty was either going up or down. That’s because there isn’t one way to measure it in the UK. In this long read, we explore the various measures of poverty used by politicians and the media, and what they actually mean. 

Brexit

Remember that really long post about the Lisbon Treaty? It hit a number of inboxes and Facebook feeds this year, and it might well get some tensions brewing over the turkey. Disclaimer: there’s a lot wrong with it. Grab a cup of eggnog and watch the facts unfold. 

Events earlier this year had many of us questioning: what is the Irish backstop? We no longer have to discuss it now it's been replaced with the Northern Ireland protocol in Boris Johnson’s new deal. We looked at whether this new deal creates a border in the Irish Sea.

Bored of board games?

Take our social media 'fact or fiction' quiz and share it with your loved ones to see who can best identify false content online. 
Take the Quiz

Twelve days of Christmas: how much would it cost?

Last year we saw a rendition of the Twelve Days of Christmas which saw the carolers make a series of extremely bold promises. 

Could these singers seriously claim, with a straight face, that their true love had delivered them an increasingly large and ostentatious array of gifts over a twelve-day period from Christmas Day onwards?

We decided to look into the numbers behind these claims, should you decide to replicate this gift strategy for your own true love.
Costs a-leaping?
Do something big this Christmas. Join our supporters.

False information doesn’t stop at Christmas. We still need your help to ramp up the fight for trust in politics. Can you do something really big, and join our supporters?

This year our supporters have enabled us to reach more people than ever before, giving millions of voters during the election access to the facts they deserve.

In 2020, we face new challenges. We have a new government and a new Parliament, and we’re even more determined to hold our politicians and media to the high standards that all of us need for a fair democracy. The people who stand behind us will be vital in making sure this fight is louder than ever before.

Can you show your support for honesty in politics, and join thousands of others in backing independent, impartial fact checking?
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You've been amazing this year.
Merry Christmas from the team at Full Fact.
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