UK heatwave: Burnham considers ban on disposable barbecues to prevent wildfires – as it happened

Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters View image in fullscreen A cyclist rides past a wildfire warning public information notice in Richmond Park, London, as parts of the country face the fifth heatwave of the summer. Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters From 20h ago Disposable barbecues could be banned to help prevent fires, the prime minister has said. Speaking to reporters on a visit to Stevenage, Andy Burnham said a ban was something the government was “certainly going to consider”. Prime minister Andy Burnham during his visit to the Oval Community Centre in Stevenage, Hertfordshire. Photograph: James Manning/PAAs reported earlier, the prime minister will chair an emergency Cobra meeting in response to the extreme heat. Burnham said: double quotation markThere is obviously a significant problem of wildfires in the south. The New Forest fire is a great concern; we have seen them in northern areas, as well as Suffolk recently. This is a message for the public as well because the wildfires I mentioned, many of them have been created . I do believe we need to get the message out loud and clear. People should not be using those barbecues outside at this moment in time. Disposable barbecues have been the cause of a number of serious fires over the last few years, but campaigners were critical of the PM’s failure to link those fires more broadly to the climate crisis. Read the full story here. Andy Burnham will chair an emergency Cobra meeting in response to the extreme heat, which has caused wildfires and plunged many parts of Britain into drought. The prime minister will meet ministers, officials and agencies as high temperatures continue across the UK, with 33C forecast on Wednesday and up to 38C on Thursday. Andrew Saprrow will be covering any news coming out of this on the UK politics blog here. The Met Office has issued an amber weather warning for extreme heat across parts of England tomorrow, in place from 9am until midnight. In an update on X, it said: “Temperatures will rise quickly tomorrow, with many areas reaching 35C+ and highs of 36-37C possible, especially across the Midlands, east and south-east.” Yvette Cooper, the health secretary, has said that she has told NHS England to start planning ahead for summer heatwaves, just as it prepares every year for a crisis in the winter. In an article published in the Mirror, Cooper says global heating means Britain will face heatwaves like the one we are going through now “with increasing frequency and increasing intensity”.