For almost a day, it covered the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal by suggesting they might have overdosed on recreational drugs.

Now the Kremlin’s English-language TV channel, RT, faces removal from parliament after the leader of the Commons, Andrea Leadsom, told The Sunday Times she would ask for a review of whether it should be screened at Westminster.

RT, formerly known as Russia Today, says the British media have “gone mad” in the quest to find a “Russia link [to the Skripal attack] despite no evidence”.

The channel prides itself on “reporting what the mainstream media doesn’t” and last week gave substantial airtime to a claim that the Skripals were potential drug abusers who had fallen ill after taking fentanyl, an opioid “responsible for