Now that at long last we appear to be having decent summer weather, with temperatures in the high 20s, why is it that many buses running in London still have their heaters on full blast?

Many people in my group have consistently complained to Transport for London about this issue over the past two or three summers.

But despite assurances that the bus companies have been instructed to tell their staff to turn off heaters, the problem still persists and I have myself already had cause to raise this issue with them this year on several occasions.

What I find most laughable is that, on the one hand, passengers on the London Underground are advised to carry bottles of water with them in the hot weather, yet on the buses which come within the same remit as the Underground, under TfL, it is often even more unbearable to travel thanks to the buses’ heaters being left full on.

One of the worst routes for this is my local W6, operated by First and running between Southgate Station and Edmonton Green, via Palmers Green.

The small single-deckers on this route are frequently overcrowded thanks to the route’s usual appalling timekeeping (and, I suspect, poor supervision), often with drivers cramming as many as a dozen standing passengers (often schoolchildren) into the platform area in flagrant contravention of safety regulations, and with the heaters full on too, travelling in them is unbearable. The problem, however, is London-wide.

Will it take one of London Buses passengers to suffer a stroke, and perhaps die, as a result of this problem before those responsible for running the services take it seriously?

JIM BLAKE, honourary chairman, North London Transport Society