Dear Friend,

In the newsletter this week...
But first...

Local elections are taking place across England tomorrow, with some voters being able to elect mayors and councillors. 

 Amongst many things, we’ve been looking at a claim by Nigel Farage, who recently said on X: “Since Kemi Badenoch became Tory leader, Reform UK have gained more seats in council by-elections than any other party.” 

It isn’t entirely clear what the word “gained” means, so we’ve conducted our own analysis.
Read our analysis...
Full Fact analysis of the available data on 121 council by-elections across Great Britain since last November suggests Reform UK saw the largest net gain in seats, but more seats changed hands to the Conservatives than to Reform UK. Labour won the most seats overall.
Best wishes, 

Craig, Audience Engagement Manager—Full Fact

P.S. Don’t forget if you’re able to vote tomorrow there are new photo identification rules, if you’re uncertain what kind of ID you’ll need we’ve got you covered.
FACT CHECKS

Online influencer shares bad suncare advice
When we’re not writing fact checks the Full Fact team love to top up our tan, especially in this weather. One of the people we aren’t listening to when it comes to advice on the impact of sun exposure is Ellie Grey. 

In widely shared posts on Facebook and Instagram the influencer claimed that wearing sunglasses raises the risk of sunburn and that the sun does not cause skin cancer. 

Both of these claims are false, and we have written about similar claims before. In fact about 90% of UK melanoma skin cancer cases could be prevented if people stayed safe in the sun, and avoided sunbed.

A member of our team has shared some well sourced advice from a sunny outdoors location.
Read more

Is Labour right to claim Reform UK would ‘scrap the NHS’?
Throughout the local election campaign Labour has criticised comments made by Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, including those in which he has suggested he is open to an alternative funding model for the NHS.

Full Fact doesn't fact check the future, so it is impossible to say what a political party will do if it forms a government.

But we’ve taken a look at what Reform UK has said it will do and what Mr Farage has said about NHS funding.
 
Read more
Support Full Fact
 
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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David Lammy has not personally spent £521,525 on food and drink
A number of social media posts have claimed that David Lammy MP has incurred £521,525 in food and drink expenses during his first 233 days as foreign secretary.

A Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) spokesperson told Full Fact the social media post was “false and misleading” and confirmed the spend “relates to the entire FCDO Network—covering over 17,000 staff across 281 worldwide offices—over a period of four months”.
Read more

Government tracker

Full Fact’s most recent updates to our tracker of government policy.
Discover our Government tracker
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All the best,
Team Full Fact

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