and a hit for the overcrowding and a hit for the high street. >> boxing day shoppers are staying away from the high street compared with last year, as footfall data suggests. >> newly unsealed documents show tony blair attempted to amend a gerry adams statement on ira disarmament. our reporter dougie beattie will be having the latest . latest. >> and speculation continues. russia's anti—aircraft system russia's anti —aircraft system was russia's anti—aircraft system was responsible for the azerbaijan airlines crash, which happened on christmas day. however, the kremlin have responded and denied all allegations as nato demands answers. >> it's a misty and murky start for many of us today. join me later for a full weather update for the next few days. >> hello! it is just gone 6:00 i'm dawn neesom and i'm cameron walker and this is gb news breakfast. okay, a fresh fire

has broken out between reform ukip leader nigel farage and conservative leader kemi badenoch. >> yes, well, it follows the party claiming to have surpassed the total number of conservative party members, according to a digital tracker. >> but kemi badenoch has slammed the announcement as fake and issuing misleading figures. >> well, nigel farage has since hit back, accusing her of being bitter, upset and angry. >> meanwhile, in other political news, the government has been urged to move thousands of inmates to open prisons in efforts to deal with the overcrowding crisis. >> well, let's talk now to the political commentator peter spencen political commentator peter spencer. peter, welcome to gb news. so a bit of a twitter spat happening over the last 24 hours or so. who's right.7 >> it's very hard to tell who's right because of the fact that the tories don't keep a very clear record of their membership, and farage's side are only have only got a sort of are only have only got a sort of a ticker tape thing. so it's, it's hard to actually discern

the reality. but behind all that, the fact is that both farage and kemi badenoch have raised the raised goblins to the level of an art form, and they're having a lovely time saying mine is bigger than yours. me me me me me. and so it goes on. but behind all that is the reality that that one of the big stories of 2025 is bound to be.the big stories of 2025 is bound to be. the fact that nigel farage's reform party is the one to watch. and this there can be little question about the fact that his he's he's the new kid on the block and he says he reckons he can break the mould of british politics. and indeed it's not very difficult for him to do so. it seems to me only yesterday that the sdp, the gang of four, tried to break the mould of british politics when they broke away from michael foot all those years back, and that didn't that fat lot of good

that didn't that fat lot of good that didn't that fat lot of good that did them. but since then, it's perfectly obvious that the old class based system of voting, you know, if you're a horny handed son of toil, then you voted labour. and if you drove a volvo, you were a conservative. well, that was then. this is now. the fact is that at the last election, for example, the labour party got its historic win on the basis of the lowest vote share of any winning party for nearly a century. so, frankly, all bets are off. >> and the pictures we were just showing now, peter, was our nigel farage and the reform party beaming their membership numbers onto the head office of the conservative party. there you can see it there, obviously, that turquoise we're all used to now. but i mean, tory membership is the lowest on record, isn't it? it's 131,000 and it is the lowest on record, isn't it.7 it's 131,000 and it was 172,000. just what, two and a half years ago now.7 >> half years ago now? >> oh, yeah. i mean, there's i

come back to it. nigel farage nigel farage is the new kid on the block . and the conservatives the block. and the conservatives are sort of fighting a kind of a rearguard action and have been actually for some years because of the turbulence of their own party. and then i consider the words of the nation's top polling guru, sir john curtice, who said, look, quite honestly, neither the labour party nor the tory party do narrative. nigel farage, reform party, it does do narrative . and, you know, narrative. and, you know, without any disrespect to either sir keir starmer or to kemi badenoch, the fact is that that nigel farage has got more charisma, more television presence and the two of them put together. let's face it, peter, the reform party chairman, zaur yousef, has said that he would gladly invite one of the top four audit firms in to verify their numbers. >> but at the same time, we've got kemi badenoch saying on

twitter that those numbers are fake and it's all to do, alleging that it's been manipulation of the back end of the reform website that's produced this figure. so why is kemi so confident that she is correct in this instance? >> i'm not actually a mind reader. i can't really answer that question, but i guess i guess she has to. she has to, as it were, keep the end up. but this but but for nigel farage, the joy of all this is the fact and even the fact that kemi badenoch is grumbling about it and screeching about it. the fact. what? here we are, sat here on the box talking about nigel farage. and so all this stuff up, up ups his profile and makes it easier for him to recruit more people, whether he's got more people on side at this stage than the tories doesn't really matter. the fact is they're on their way up. and when you consider that his his

best chum, elon musk is making potential noises about shoving a whole load of money in their direction, then they stand quite a good chance of actually turning from just sort of kind of a fringe organisation to a properly organised, nationally based party, which again, would give them a bit of a springboard come the may local elections to actually make serious headway and suddenly transform their their status within the body politic from being an insurgent to being an established figure, established organisation peta this i mean, we expect this from nigel farage. >> we know, you know, almost like trump. he is brilliant at manipulating headlines and getting publicity. the fact that kemi badenoch responded in the way she did, it seems more unbecoming of kemi, although she does have a reputation of being able to start a fight in an empty room as well. but i mean, it's like both of them having a

go at each other on social media, like a couple of 12 year olds. >> well, yes, actually, i mean, i was not going to be so impolite as to suggest that that it came across. i was actually thinking more in terms of infant school, in point of fact, but. but but yeah, it's i mean she, she, she loves i mean, i remember margaret thatcher saying all those years ago, i love a good fight. well, so does she. whether she can win this one is another matter. but yeah but but sure, i mean she just simply doesn't want to leave the ground open for nigel farage to trample on her in terms of media perception, which is, you know, in the, in this modern age of, of, of, of social media and immediate, very, very rapidly moving headlines, it's very important as far as she can make out to actually be on the front foot as much of the time as she possibly can. and it's also worth remembering that when, when starmer was pitching to be

the prime minister, he sort of made a virtue of saying, right, well, from now on, we're going to make politics boring again. and that would have worked maybe had it not been for nigel farage. he's up the ante and put the wind up just about everyone. >> and peter, can we ask you about another story? front page of the times this morning. a senior government adviser who used to be a tory formerjustice used to be a tory former justice minister, suggesting that we should send more convicts to open prisons in order to ease overcrowding. i suppose the dangeris overcrowding. i suppose the danger is that you can't guarantee that prisoners in open prisons don't abscond. there's been a number of high profile absconds, if that's the word, over the last couple of years, some of which have previous convictions for violent behaviour. >> yes, there is that risk, of course, but you have to look at the context here that the prisons are so overcrowded that they reduced the time of a

sentence from 50%, and it's now gone down to 40%. and of course, there have been lurid tales of people being released early and then going out to reoffend, sometimes in a particularly unpleasant fashion. so there is a very, very real problem here. and i can remember starmer dunng and i can remember starmer during the during the election campaign saying, well, i can't just go to campaign saying