Fact check: Is Sadiq Khan right about fires?

Will global warming condemn Britain to more fires? Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London, has been widely quoted this morning comparing recent fires around the capital to the Blitz. ‘Yesterday was the busiest day for the fire service in London since the second world war,’ he said – climate change caused the heatwave which ‘led to the fires’. He added that he was dismayed that the Tory leadership contenders were not discussing this ‘elephant in the room.’

So is this right – or misleading? As so often, it’s a mixture. Khan is correct to say that the number of calls to London fire brigade was a record high: it received more than 2,600 calls. But 999 call handlers can receive hundreds of calls about the same incident. Yesterday the fire brigade responded to 1,146 ‘incidents’ – again the most on record but only slightly above the previous high of 1,058. The records don’t go back before 2009 so how likely is it that 1,146 incidents – almost four times the average – is a postwar high?

But the link between fires and climate change? That’s harder, and more context is needed.