It’s Lydia Dingle (Karen Blick)’s birthday soon on Emmerdale and a glamorous surprise birthday party is planned for her at Home Farm.

Nobody deserves a party more than Lydia, of course. She’s the glue who holds the Dingle family together during their most traumatic and dramatic moments and everybody in the family loves her.

At Home Farm her boss and friend Kim Tate (Claire King) couldn’t do without her and cherishes her friendship as much as she relies on her cleaning expertise.

On the other hand, it is an odd time for a party, especially at Home Farm There’s a very unsettled atmosphere currently in the grandest house in the area.

Billy (Jay Kontzle) and Dawn (Olivia Bromley) have broken up after Dawn decided she wanted a future with Joe Tate (Ned Porteous), Billy is devastated and the children are confused.

Meanwhile the village is still reeling from the limo crash that caused the death of three of Emmerdale’s women, while Caleb Miligan (William Ash) is reeling from the loss of one of his kidneys.

And the common denominator in all this is Joe Tate. His affair with Dawn that destroyed her relationship with Billy is about to be exposed in dramatic fashion when daughter Clemmie (Mabel Addison) spots Joe and Dawn kissing and eventually tells Billy what’s been going on.

Elsewhere Charity (Emma Atkins) learns that Joe was behind the spiking of Noah (Jack Downham) that led him to stumble in front of the limo she was driving, thus directly causing the crash that killed Suzy (Martelle Edinborough), Leyla (Roxy Shahidi) and Amy (Natlalie Ann Jamieson).

Caleb is seething with the knowledge of the terrible trauma done to his body after Joe arranged for his kidney to be removed so Joe could have it.

So far he’s been powerless to do anything about it because Joe also has the knowledge that Caleb and Ruby (Beth Cordingly) had something to do with Anthony (Nicholas Day)’s mysterious disappearance.

And when Kerry (Laura Norton) finds out that it was Joe who was behind her daughter Amy’s death, she’ll be another person who’s out for revenge.

Lydia’s birthday party will be the backdrop as all of these simmering tensions come to a head and Joe Tate becomes the target of a lot of angry people who are all very keen to see him pay for his various crimes.