As temperatures topped 32 degrees Celsius (90 degrees Fahrenheit) at midday (1100 GMT) in parts of southern England, some firms gave workers the afternoon off and several schools in London let pupils go home two hours early.

City parks filled with sunbathers and television stations showed sunseekers swimming in the sea at the southern English resort of Bournemouth.

The Meteorological Office said there was a chance that Britain's all-time record of 38.5 degrees Celsius (101 degrees Fahrenheit), recorded in August 2003, could even be beaten in some areas but that temperatures would cool toward the end of the week.

Most forecasts suggested temperatures could match or top the July record of 36 degrees Celsius (96.8 degrees Fahrenheit), recorded at Epsom, southwest of London, on July 22, 1911.

British temperatures earlier this week outstripped popular holiday destinations, including Athens, Bermuda, Rio de Janeiro and Rome.

Health officials urged the public to drink plenty of water and use sun cream if working or relaxing outdoors, while the Blue Cross animal welfare charity warned that pets needed protection from sun stroke.

Keepers at Colchester Zoo in eastern England gave lions ice blocks flavoured with blood and monkeys ice blocks containing fruit.

A fleet of more than 50 gritters were on stand-by in Staffordshire, central England, to tackle roads where the tar had started to melt.

Staffordshire County Council said it was loading up with granite rock dust to spread on highways and anticipated distributing around 100 tonnes of it by the end of the current hot snap.

A spokesman said the dust protected roads from further damage by sealing their surface and keeping them dry and stable.

Water was being offered meanwhile to motorists stuck on the A14 motorway in Cambridgeshire, eastern England, following two accidents, police said.

Members of the Spartan Rescue service would use quad bikes to take water to drivers waiting in traffic, a police spokeswoman said.

"Water will be made available to those stuck in traffic and we would ask that people who want the water signal to those on quad bikes," she said.

In the lower house of parliament, the House of Commons, Speaker Michael Martin relaxed the strict dress code which compels reporters to wear jackets in the Press Gallery.

The BBC's website said schools in central London would close at 1:30 pm (1230 GMT), or two hours early, over the next few days.

Some offices were allowing workers to leave early.

Greesmans, a London solicitors' firm, closed at 1:00 pm (1200 GMT).

"It's so hot it's impossible to work in the office today. It's unbearable," office manager Vindhya Chandrapala, 40, told AFP.

"We've never done this before. We are leaving one person to answer the phone and all the other staff are going home. The company could lose some money but the solicitors can't work in this heat.

"There is no breeze in the office. The design seems to hold all the heat in."

The soaring temperatures in Britain, a country used to rain and gloomy skies even in the summer months, are attributed to global warming, according to David Viner, from the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

"The heatwave we are currently experiencing is not a one-off," he said.

Viner said climate change was inevitable but stressed that more could be done to reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses which trap heat in the Earth's atmosphere.

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