An Exhaustive List of Comebacks for Your Seasonal Family Arguments

This Christmas, like any other Christmas, will most likely be shared with family who have problematic political views. Often, this means aggressive arguments shouted over Mrs Brown's Boys and desperately trying to reel off facts while also feeling buzzed on Baileys.

To help you prepare for that living hell, we've compiled a list of factual comebacks so you can avoid screaming into their faces.

• Hate crimes surged by 23 percent in the 11 months since the referendum – an unprecedented rise. (The Independent).
• The UK recorded its first year-on-year drop in consumer spending since 2013, highlighting the pressures facing households from the rising cost of living since Brexit. (The Guardian)

• EU citizens are being discriminated against in jobs. A dossier compiled by the pressure group "The 3 million" evidences the fact that EU jobseekers are now being asked for proof of British or Irish citizenship. (The 3 Million)
• UK Household finances are already worse since the vote. (Bank Of England )
• Eating five fruit and veg a day will become "unaffordable for millions" after Brexit. (The Food Foundation)

• More than 300,000 people in Britain – or one in every 200 – are officially recorded as homeless or living in inadequate homes, according to figures by Shelter. (The Guardian)
• Homelessness is so severe that a report from the Department for Communities and Local Government called it a "national crisis" and said the government has been "unacceptably complacent" in its response. (The Guardian)
• Of a total of 947,000 disability welfare claimants who were reassessed in the year to October of 2017, 22 percent saw their support reduced, while a quarter were disallowed or withdrawn altogether. At the same time, the amount paid to the private companies that carry out the assessments increased by an average of 30 percent. (The Independent)

• Theresa May vowed to protect police funding recently, but Commons figures reveal the Prime Minister secretly slashed £413 million in funding for them last month. (The Mirror)
• Think-tanks have said that even based on the government’s current spending plans for the NHS, there is likely to be a spending gap of over £20 billion by 2022/23. (Fullfact)

• 94 percent of British journalists are white, and across the BBC only 6 percent of senior roles are made up of people from an ethnic minority background. (Ofcom)
• The number of police stop and searches fell 28 percent in 2015-16, but black people were still six times more likely to be stopped than white people. (The Guardian)

• Research suggested there was a 23 percent gap in hourly pay between black and white university graduates. (The Guardian)
• Global professional services firm PwC revealed that it pays its black, Asian and minority-ethnic staff in the UK almost 13 percent less than other employees. (The Independent)

• 45 years after the Equal Pay Act, for every hour women work, they still earn just 81p of every pound earned by men. (Women’s Equality Party)
• An estimated 1.3 million women in Britain have experienced domestic abuse in the last year alone, yet women’s refugees are critically underfunded – on a typical day, 155 women are turned away. (The Independent)
• In the most popular TV programmes across three genres and four channels, men outnumber women by a ratio of almost 6:4. (Women’s Equality Party)

• In politics, women make up just 29 percent of MPs and 24 percent of peers. (Women’s Equality Party)
• It was recently announced that the UK is the worst EU country for tackling gender discrimination. (The Guardian)

• A Legatum Institute report found that when it comes to some of Labour’s key election policies on nationalisation, the majority of the public agree with Corbyn. (The Guardian)
• His 2017 manifesto wasn’t particularly radical: it argued for house-building; rent controls; expanded welfare provisions; more rights for minority groups; more money and support for carers; and more help for the mentally ill. (Labour 2017 Manifesto)
• Abolishing tuition fees isn’t unheard of. In Germany, tuition is free and they actually spent a smaller percentage of their GDP on higher education than the UK in 2012. (The Mirror)

• Britain's corporation tax rate is currently 19 percent after the Tories cut it from 26 percent. Labour pledged to reverse it, but even 26 percent would be the lowest rate among G7 countries, according to the OECD. Canada charges 27 percent, Italy 28 percent, Germany 30 percent and Japan 30 percent. (The Mirror)
• The Tory government outraged green campaigners by refusing to ban fracking, but Labour said they would end it in their 2017 manifesto. This has already been done in France, Bulgaria and Germany. (The Mirror)

• The Gender Identity Research & Education Society (GIRES) estimates that about 1 percent of the British population are gender non-conforming to some degree. (GIRES)
• Eight out of ten trans young people have self-harmed, and almost half have attempted to kill themselves. (The Guardian)
• Contrary to popular belief, trans people have existed throughout history. They have been documented in many indigenous, Western and Eastern cultures and societies from antiquity until the present day. (Azytypo)

• Research from the US revealed that trans women are nearly twice as likely to suffer sexual violence as other women. (The Guardian)
• 70 percent of trans survey respondents reported being denied access, verbally harassed, or physically assaulted in public restrooms. (CNN)

• Twitter reports that more than 1.7 million women and men have used the hashtag in 85 countries, highlighting the effect globally. (CNN)
• The hashtag and movement led to 13 women accusing Harvey Weinstein of rape and 82 of assault. (Wikipedia)
• More than 100 high powered men are now accused of sexual assault. (USA Today)

• People who experience sexual violence have a 94 percent chance of developing PTSD, meaning sharing stories is a way of accessing help. (Huffington Post)

For an added treat you could read all these facts out instead of Christmas cracker jokes and start the debates early.

@RuchoSharma