What was claimed
A photo shows a young Keir Starmer with Jimmy Savile, decorating a Christmas tree.
Our verdict
This photo has been edited to include Savile’s face. The original image shows Mr Starmer with an older woman, reportedly his grandmother.
Faked photo of Keir Starmer and Jimmy Savile decorating a Christmas tree recirculates
A photo supposedly showing the Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer when he was younger decorating a Christmas tree with serial sex abuser Jimmy Savile is circulating online again.
This didn’t happen—an old picture has been edited to include Savile’s face.
As we’ve explained before, the original image shows Mr Starmer with a different person. It was published by the Guardian in May 2024 with the caption: “Starmer with his grandmother”.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen altered or fake images that claim to show the PM with Savile—one photo supposedly showing them together was actually taken of Mr Starmer in 2022, 11 years after Savile died, and his face was superimposed over Gordon Brown’s in the fake.
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This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as altered because this photo has been edited to include Jimmy Savile’s face on the body of someone else, reportedly Mr Starmer’s grandmother.