Round-up of fact checks from the last few days compiled by Full Fact
This round-up of claims has been compiled by Full Fact, the UK’s independent fact checking charity which works to give people access to reliable information they can trust.
Welfare payments have not exceeded income tax ‘for the first time ever’
An “Alternative King’s Speech” published by the Conservatives on Monday claimed: “For the first time ever, the total welfare bill is now higher than total receipts from income tax.”
This is a claim we have heard a few times in recent weeks from politicians and in the media. But it is not correct.
Total welfare spending was higher than income tax receipts in 2025/26, according to figures from the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), but this is far from the first time that has happened.
According to Full Fact’s research with historical OBR documents, welfare spending – which includes state pensions as well as universal credit and other benefits – has been higher than income tax receipts every year for at least the last 13 years. Indeed the gap narrowed significantly in 2025/26, and the positions are set to reverse next year – meaning this year is expected to be the last for the foreseeable future that welfare is higher than income tax in the UK, not the first.
We shared our figures with the Institute for Fiscal Studies, which looked at the question independently and agreed with us.
“What’s changing,” said Tom Waters, an associate director and head of the income, work and welfare sector, “is that welfare spending is forecast to be lower than income tax receipts in 2026/27 for the first time since at least 2013/14, and then remain that way until the end of the forecast period in 2030/31.”
We are not sure where the claim that welfare payments are now higher than income tax receipts for the first time ever came from. We saw it mentioned by a couple of different media outlets early last month (one of which has since corrected the claim after we got in touch), and it was shared on X by a number of Conservative politicians, including the shadow work and pensions secretary Helen Whately, and Rebecca Smith MP.
Conservative MP Dr Luke Evans made the same claim in an article on his website on April 8, as did the party leader Kemi Badenoch, at Prime Minister’s Questions on April 29.
Separately, we saw the same claim made by the Reform MP Robert Jenrick on Facebook.
It is important to remember that many working people receive benefits, and many people who are not working, including pensioners, pay income tax. Working people pay national insurance too. So the welfare and income tax figures do not simply show how much the Government spends on people who are out of work, or receives from people who are working.
The WHO has not said hantavirus is spreading ‘very fast across the world’
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has not said that hantavirus is spreading “very fast across the world”, contrary to claims being made on social media.
Posts making this false claim have been circulating widely on X and Facebook since the outbreak of the cluster of hantavirus cases aboard the MV Hondius cruise ship.
In a press conference in Madrid on May 12, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the WHO’s assessment continues to be that the risk to health globally “continues to be low”.
He added: “At the moment, there is no sign that we are seeing the start of a larger outbreak, but of course the situation could change and, given the long incubation period of the virus, it’s possible we might see more cases in the coming weeks.”
On May 8 and again on May 13 the WHO said the risk to the global population was low and for those on the ship it was moderate. It has described the current outbreak as a “cluster”.
A spokesperson for the WHO told us that its statements have not made any mention of the comments attributed to it in the claim circulating on social media.
