Emmerdale airs a major new setback for Joe Tate next week, as the full extent of his cruel blackmail plot is laid bare for his partner Dawn Fletcher.

The truth comes out as Ross Barton and Robert Sugden strike a surprising alliance, putting their differences aside as they try to expose Joe once and for all.

Both Ross and Robert are hell-bent on bringing Joe down, and with Ross now Director of Operations at Home Farm, the two guys have access to his laptop.

They know that if they can delete the incriminating video of Victoria Sugden killing her brother John in self-defence, Joe’s leverage against them will disappear. But as they put the plan into action, they hit a stumbling block…

“Dawn is well aware that Joe is no Snow White, but she has no idea of the true depths of his dastardliness,” shares our Dales spy.

“Initially, she’s raging to catch Ross and Robert hacking into Joe’s laptop, but that all changes when Robert blurts out what Joe has done. Dawn is about to discover just how low Joe will go.”

The video in question shows just how desperate Victoria was when John targeted her, but it could still lead to her being jailed for life. Robert was willing to do anything to stop that from happening, even going behind Cain and Moira Dingle’s backs to help Joe get their farm.

What Dawn now has to process is that Joe used the plight of Victoria, a single mum who was protecting herself, as leverage for a land-grab.

For a mother whose family means everything to her, realising Joe would have cheerfully wrecked the lives of Vic and her son Harry just to get back at Robert will be sobering.

But the big question is, what will Dawn do now that she’s armed with this information?

Problems could be building up elsewhere for Joe too, as Natalie J Robb has recently warned that her character Moira may go out fo