“We cannot simply sit back and do nothing in the face of rising heat and floods.”
By Maryam Eslamdoust
This summer has seen unprecedented temperatures in Britain, with thermometers regularly reaching into the 30s across the country. Reform’s Richard Tice may blithely say we should just sit back and enjoy the hot weather, but the truth is that we are not equipped to deal with the ever-increasing heat. Just look at the wildfires that have raged across the country, the droughts, and the hosepipe bans.
For workers, the effects are also hard felt. The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 require employers to ensure that there is a ‘reasonable’ indoor temperature in the workplace, and the HSE’s Approved Code of Practice (ACOP) says that employers must ‘take all reasonable steps to achieve a reasonably comfortable temperature’.
Employers can and should act to ameliorate the heat – some examples of that might include relaxing formal dress codes and uniform rules; ensuring workstations are kept out of direct sunlight, are equipped with fans, and that windows can be opened to circulate air; or adapting working patterns to avoid the hottest parts of the day – but nowhere is it defined what a ‘reasonable temperature’ is. There is no maximum temperature in law.
That’s why our members took their TSSA-issue thermometers into their workplaces throughout July, raising awareness that the heatwave is a workplace issue, while joining the TUC and others to campaign for a legal maximum working temperature.
Unless action is taken, the climate crisis means that this will become an ever more pressing issue. Hotter summers and wetter winters are likely to be the new norm in the UK.
This has a particular resonance for railway workers. In 2020, the Carmont rail derailment took the lives of three people. The heavy rains in the run-up to the crisis had caused debris from a drainage system to wash out over the tracks, resulting in the derailment. The rainfall was not the only cause of the accident (the drainage system had also not been constructed to specification), but it was a significant factor. Our heating climate is likely to increase the risks of similarly heavy rains in the future.
Last week also saw two further train derailments. While we should not seek to pre-judge the final findings of the Rail Accident Investigation Branch, the RAIB is actively investigating the role of the hot weather in the Lewes derailment. Their report will give the ultimate causes of the accident, but the fact that temperatures are even a matter for investigation should be heeded as a warning.
The Climate Change Committee has criticised the Government’s preparedness for climate change as ‘inadequate’. Ministers need to do more. While it’s true that the DfT have identified that developing climate resilience in our transport system should be a priority, and that the CCC say their adaptation policy is ‘good’, the Government is failing on delivery; the CCC describe it as ‘limited’.
That’s no wonder when we have seen cuts to Network Rail budgets that threaten 870 job losses, and proposals to take thousands more out of the organisation by not filling vacancies. The cuts also mean Network Rail’s funding is constrained in its current 5-year budgeting period – ‘Control Period 7’ – and it has now had to further reduce its planned asset renewal programme. This comes on top of a reduced programme at the start of the Control Period following a reduction in funding for its original programme in England and Wales
Our members’ jobs are climate jobs, and rail infrastructure is green infrastructure. We need to reverse the cuts while providing real investment in the transport network’s resilience. That should mean financing not only the infrastructure itself, but the skills, expertise, and the people required to make the upgrades happen.
We are already living with the effects of the climate crisis. The question is no longer if temperatures will change, but by how much. We cannot simply sit back and do nothing in the face of rising heat and floods. Instead, the new reality demands a new approach to our rights at work, our economy and, as part of that, our transport system. That’s why TSSA is campaigning for a maximum workplace temperature and real investment in the people and infrastructure needed to make our railways safe, reliable, and secure for the future.
- Maryam Eslamdoust is the General Secretary of the Transport Salaried Staffs Association (TSSA). You can follow the TSSA on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
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