UK weather latest: It's so hot even Ascot has ditched its strict dress code

Are the British such an easily distracted people that a sombre national mood and fears about the approaching storms of Brexit can be swiftly dispelled by the arrival of the summer solstice, plus a few sunny days and a Solero?

Seems so. Certainly the racegoers at Royal Ascot had nothing more urgent on their minds than how the gees gees were going to perform on going that can be fairly described as very much good to firm to too hot for hooves. Such is the febrile atmosphere that the authorities there relaxed the dress code: “We took the decision in light of the hot weather, not to enforce the jackets rule.”

Even at Glastonbury, where the etiquette is admittedly much more informal, revellers will find themselves sweating more than usual in predicted 30C highs. Not to mention their other highs, of course, maybe not advisable under the NHS’s guidelines for people at risk of sunstroke: “Those at risk are warned to keep in the shade during the hottest part of the day between 11am and 3pm”. Stick to the tent, then.

There are record-breaking, barometer-busting, thirsty scenes everywhere. Across the United Kingdom office workers are finding a ready-made excuse to ditch heels and ties and go ever more “cas” as they go to work pushing the boundaries of taste and decency ever closer to vest tops, flip flops and Bermuda shorts… and beyond?

The Met Office issued an (appropriately shaded) “amber warning” about the heat, reminding us not to leave our pets in the car or grannies parked in the deck chair. We’re enjoying the longest spell of hot weather in June in decades, this being the first time since 1996 that temperatures reached more than 30C for five consecutive days. Ah! How memories of the lazy, balmy dog days of the Major government come flooding back, a creaking minority administration plagued by rows about Europe, staggering from crisis to crisis, propped by Ulster Unionists. Older citizens might even recall the long hot summer of 1976 – still not bettered. That was the year when water had to be rationed and the nation's potato crop failed, virtually frying in the soil from Lincolnshire and East Lothian where it lay. Memories again, of the Callaghan government of the time, a creaking minority, staggering from crisis… hang on. Is this a recurring nightmare of politics consumed by the fires of Hades on a roughly 20-year cycle? Seems so.

So Monday saw the UK’s hottest day of the year, with 32.5C recorded at Hampton Waterworks in London – warmer than the Gobi desert – and forecasters say Wednesday could be as hot as 35C. Hull warmer than Bali and Brighton as hot as Barbados. Tarmac is melting, hay fever sufferers are streaming and, yes, journalists are getting overheated.

This being Britain though, the heat will soon be gone. The Met Office is forecasting rain coming through by the weekend – typically enough. It is all so reminiscent of that catchy old ballad from 1973 by Terry Jacks. Remember it? All together now:

We had joy, we had fun,

We had seasons in the sun,

But the wine and the song,

Like the seasons, have all gone.

Will the grey skies of Brexit soon return? Seems so.