Last year was the second hottest on record in the UK, the Met Office has said.

It means three of the five warmest years since 1884 have fallen in the last four years – along with 2020 and 2022.

The average mean temperature of 9.97C across the UK in 2023 puts it second only to 2022, which had an average of 10.03C, the Met Office said today as it released provisional data for last year.

Both Wales and Northern Ireland had their warmest years on record.

Met Office senior scientist Mike Kendon said: “The observations of the UK climate are clear. Climate change is influencing UK temperature records over the long term.”

He added: “While our climate will remain variable, with periods of cold and wet weather, what we have observed over recent decades is a number of high temperature records tumbling.

“We expect this pattern to continue as our climate continues to change in the coming years as a result of human-induced climate change.”

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The news may seem hard to believe for those disappointed by the soggy summer and cool July, or who have battled the recent snow.

But eight of the 12 months last year were hotter than average, and June was also the hottest on record – trends being driven by climate change, the Met Office said.

The fact so many hot years have happened recently is a sign of how the UK’s climate is changing, the Met Office had previously said.

As well as being much warmer than average, it was also wetter than average in almost every area of the country apart from western Scotland.

The rainy year helped many areas recover from drought that sank in during 2022 – which became the warmest in the UK in records dating back to 1884.

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Last year also shattered a number of rainfall records, in keeping with scientific projections that climate change will concentrate rain in the UK into intense downpours.

As the atmosphere continues to warm, Brits can expect warmer and wetter winters and hotter and drier summers.

The recent unsettled, stormy weather is due to a low pressure system that will at the end of the week give way to higher pressure, bringing colder, drier conditions.

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Zooming out to a global perspective, last year was almost certainly the hottest for 125,000 years.

However, confirmation from an official body like the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service has not yet been released.

The hot year globally was caused by climate change and the El Nino weather pattern that has a warming influence on the world’s weather, Copernicus has previously said.

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