Should your office be closed?

· The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 stipulate that the minimum temperature in an office should be 16 degrees Celsius (61 Fahrenheit).

· Further relevant statute legislation is section 6 of the Offices Shops & Railway Premises Act 1963. The appropriate bits state:

- "(2) Where a substantial proportion of the work done in a room to which the foregoing subsection applies does not involve severe physical effort, a temperature of less than 16 degrees Celsius (61F) shall not be deemed, after the first hour, to be a reasonable temperature while work is going on.

- (3)...there shall be provided for persons who are employed to work in a room to which... this section would apply, conveniently accessible and effective means of enabling them to warm themselves.

- (6)It shall be the duty of the employer of persons for whom means of enabling them to warm themselves are provided in pursuance of subsection (3) of this section to afford them reasonable opportunities for using those means, and if he fails so to do he shall be guilty of an offence."