by Will Jones
Labour is considering making it illegal to work when it is “too hot” as part of measures to “protect people from the impacts of climate change”. The Telegraph has more.
Emma Reynolds, the Environment Secretary, has said she will “carefully consider” proposals including a maximum working temperature that would force firms to let workers down tools during heatwaves.
The measure, recommended by the influential Climate Change Committee (CCC), would aim to “incentivise” businesses to protect workers by keeping their workplaces cool.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE), the workplace regulator, is developing plans for extra protection during hot weather, but is expected to stop short of setting a specific legal maximum.
The controversial recommendation for an upper limit is set out in a new report from the CCC advising ministers on the risks posed by climate change in the UK and how best to manage them.
It calls for a raft of measures to protect people against worsening heat, floods and droughts, including the rollout of air conditioning in hospitals, care homes, schools and prisons.
In a list of key proposals to help the UK adapt to more intense heat, the CCC urged the Government to “set maximum temperature regulations for workplaces”.
The report said: “Maximum working temperature regulations would address the increasing risks that high temperatures pose to workers’ safety and incentivise the deployment of the necessary cooling. Businesses are largely responsible for investing in their own adaptations but must ensure that workplaces and working practices are safe for employees, including for those working outside.”
It pointed to examples in Spain, which sets maximum legal indoor temperatures of 27°C for sedentary work and 25°C for light physical work, and other countries that enforce upper limits for outdoor labour.
The committee noted that Spanish employers are responsible for meeting the requirements and staff can report them to labour inspections or unions if they fail to comply.
In response to the CCC’s report, Reynolds said: “We are acting to protect people and places from the impacts of climate change that are already being felt across the UK – from flooding to extreme heat and drought.
“Robust, independent science is essential and we will carefully consider the climate change committee’s latest recommendations to drive further action.”
Of course, forcing employers to turn up the air conditioning is hardly going to help them use less energy and reduce their ‘carbon footprint’.
Worth reading in full.
I sent this to a friend who is a Houston-area general contractor. It got a laugh and he said he’s share it with his crew.
Wait!
Does this mean people cannot go to the beach if it is too hot?
Ban beach volleyball?
Ban running in the sand?
How will this impact kids wanting to construct sand castles?
Curious minds want to know! 😉
Just shut down all the fire departments.
Too hot is subjective. When I was young working in the oil fields of Oklahoma and Texas, their view of too hot was when the water in the rivers began to boil, and I was working with old men who had lived through that for 30 or more years. Today any temperature over average (75f or so) is too hot. Somewhere, a descendent of Ghengis Khan is thinking how easy it will be to conquer these people, and make them work when the water is boiling in the rivers.
Actually, it is the Islamists and Marxists that appear to be trying to take over the UK.
This is just another thing to decimate what little productivity the UK has left.
Geez what could go wrong here?
If the governments in southeastern Asia followed this recommendation, most of the continent would have to shut down for maybe half the year. Fortunately, residents there have learned how to deal with excessive heat, and it hasn’t affected their health or productivity one bit. It’s only where climate alarmism gets a certain amount of attention that governments and doomsayers get some limited attention on the matter, but very limited. Then people get on with their jobs and lives.
Just looking at the picture. Guy with “limited” hair cover… not wearing a hat.
Do that for too long in Australia your head will go bright red and blister…
.. and they will be cutting chunks of basal cell carcinoma out of your noggin…
I know this from first-hand experience.
All the years I spent in Britain and I never once thought it was the slightest bit hot. What I did notice is that on some nice sunny days the other drivers were acting like maniacs, red faces and gesticulating … was that the heat?
We may have the U.K. Met office to blame, one of their latest predictions is a five degree C higher temperature in summer, based on the now discarded RCP 8.5.
Of course the Climate Change Committee would not challenge the met office.