Temperature Exposure
What’s the issue?
- A rapidly changing climate is exposing the world’s' most vulnerable workers to a host of new risks, from increased health risks, job insecurity, and economic and psychological stress.
- It is estimated that climate change is already impacting over 2.7bn workers (approximately 70% of the total global workforce).
- Extreme temperatures increase the likelihood of heat illness, cold stress, and long-term health impacts.
- Unsafe temperatures can lower efficiency, increase errors, and disrupt work schedules.
- Workers in high-risk environments face income loss, fewer opportunities, and heightened vulnerability.
- Workers in lower-resource countries and outdoor or physically demanding roles are disproportionately affected.
What’s our position?
Extremes of temperature, both heat and cold, pose a significant and escalating risk to workers, not only in the UK but around the world.
As climate change progresses, new challenges emerge that affect worker safety, productivity, and wellbeing.
These challenges are not limited to physical health, they also include increased psychological stress, job insecurity, and economic vulnerability, particularly for workers in outdoor, physically demanding, or low-resource environments.
Climate change is already affecting an estimated 2.7 billion workers globally, roughly 70% of the global workforce, creating conditions that are unsafe, unpredictable, and in many cases preventable.
Without clear guidance and protections from governments and international bodies, workers are exposed to risks that can lead to heat illness, cold stress, accidents, and long-term health impacts, while businesses face reduced productivity and operational challenges.
We believe that safe working temperatures are a fundamental worker right. Temperature exposure should be recognised as both a workplace safety issue and a priority of workplace wellbeing.
Ensuring that all workers have access to safe, comfortable, and manageable working conditions is not optional; it is a shared responsibility that requires coordinated action from employers, governments, and international bodies.
Asks:
In our workplaces (For Employers):
- Develop and implement a formal Workplace Temperature Policy setting out acceptable temperature thresholds, response protocols, and roles/responsibilities.
- Institute ongoing risk assessments for thermal exposure across all worksites and job roles.
- Provide training for all workers, operating in high-risk geographical areas, on the symptoms of heat illness and emergency response.
- Provide clean drinking water at all workplaces and provide climate-controlled rest areas where temperatures regularly reach acceptable temperature thresholds (both min and max).
Across the UK (Government, policymakers and regulatory):
UK Government:
- Update the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 to include specific temperature protections.
- Recognise workplace temperature exposure as a climate justice and public health issue in national adaptation plans.
- Develop a National Heat Resilience Strategy before the end of this Parliament, which incorporates worker protections for companies operating in the UK.
Health and Safety Executive:
- Embed thermal risk evaluation into routine HSE audits and inspections.
Around the world:
- ISO (International Organization for Standardization) and WHO (World Health Organization) should introduce new minimum and maximum global standards for workplace temperature exposure.
- Embed occupational thermal safety in national climate adaptation plans under the UNFCCC framework.