This round-up of claims has been compiled by Full Fact, the UK’s independent fact checking charity which works to give people access to reliable information they can trust.
Hottest days in the UK
As the UK has seen successive heatwaves this year, social media posts have wrongly claimed a day in June saw the highest temperature recorded in the UK since 1976, and suggested this is evidence that global warming isn’t real.
But a Met Office spokesperson said this is “fundamentally incorrect”.
Posts shared on June 26 said: “Today is the hottest day in the UK since 1976. That means 50 years ago it was still just as hot as it is today. Global Warming is a lie.”
The temperature on June 26 2026 actually broke the record temperature for the month of June set in 1976. It was not the hottest day recorded in the UK since then — there have been hotter days recorded in other months between 1976 and 2026. The record for the hottest day in England, and the UK, is 40.3C on July 19 2022 in Coningsby, Lincolnshire.
According to the Met Office, the provisional temperature on June 26 was 37.7C in Lingwood, Norfolk, setting a new record for the hottest day in June. This beat the previous June record of 35.6C in Southampton in 1976 (which itself equalled a previous record of 35.6C set in Camden Square, London, in 1957). The highest temperature recorded during the heatwave of 1976 was 35.9C in Cheltenham on July 3.
A spokesperson for the Met Office said that a comparison of two individual days in 2026 and 1976 is not evidence that global warming isn’t real.
Four of the last five years are in the UK’s top-five warmest years by mean temperature since the series began in 1884. Speaking in January 2026, after 2025 was confirmed as the hottest year in the UK on record, the Met Office’s head of climate attribution Dr Mark McCarthy said: “Although it doesn’t mean every year will be the warmest on record, it is clear from our weather observations and climate models that human-induced global warming is impacting the UK’s climate.”
The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said it is “unequivocal” that human influence has warmed the atmosphere.
Poster about ‘high risk of sexual assault’ in Glasgow not from council
A fake poster from Glasgow City Council warning an area has a “high risk of sexual assault” has been circulating widely on social media. This is not a genuine message endorsed by the council.
The image, which is laid out like a poster, says “WARNING” and “HIGH RISK OF SEXUAL ASSAULT”, along with text saying: “This area has reports of sexual assaults. Stay alert.”
The graphic, which includes the Glasgow City Council logo, also offers advice such as to “travel in groups”, “avoid isolated areas after dark”, and “report suspicious activity immediately”.
It has been shared on social media by accounts presenting it as an official notice for display in the city.
But when we contacted Glasgow City Council, it told us it was not produced by the authority.
Police Scotland recently warned that misinformation about Glasgow is being spread online.
A Glasgow City Council spokesman said: “We all have to take care to ensure the veracity of the information we share online about Glasgow.”
Posts stating Andy Burnham has no legal right to be Prime Minister are inaccurate
Many widely shared social media posts have claimed that Andy Burnham MP “has no legal right to be Prime Minister” because he wasn’t elected in a general election.
This isn’t correct. While by modern convention the Prime Minister is an MP, there is no law that specifies they must have been elected to Parliament in a general election.
Several posts on Facebook have shared text claiming: “Apparently, Burnham cannot legally hold the position as UK Prime Minister. And if the king allows him to take this role, the king of England himself should abdicate.”
The Cabinet Manual, which is the official “guide to laws, conventions and rules on the operation of government”, says that the Prime Minister is appointed “by virtue of his or her ability to command the confidence of the House of Commons”, and that this will normally be the “leader of a political party that commands the majority of the House of Commons”. Prime ministers have sat in the House of Lords in the past but today it’s expected that they will either already be an MP or about to become one.
There is no mention in the Cabinet Manual of an MP needing to have been elected in a general election in order to become Prime Minister, however, and we’ve also not seen any credible media reports or claims from other politicians that this is the case. The Institute for Government has also confirmed that Andy Burnham does have a constitutional mandate to become Prime Minister.
The most recent previous example of someone becoming Prime Minister when they had not been elected as an MP in a general election came in 1963, though at the time he was appointed Sir Alec Douglas-Home was sitting in the House of Lords. He renounced his peerage and won a by-election to become an MP shortly afterwards.
