Last month was the hottest June on record in Britain, the country's national weather service said on Monday, warning that human-induced climate change was making such temperature records increasingly likely.

Record heat waves have become a worldwide pattern, as scientists warn that efforts to halt a rise in temperatures are falling short of what is needed to avert the most catastrophic effects of global warming.

Britain's Met Office said the average mean temperature of 15.8 degrees Celsius in June was the highest in a series going back almost 140 years, beating a previous record of 14.9 degrees Celsius set in 1940 and 1976.

"All the numbers are suggesting that we're going in the wrong direction when it comes to the heat, the intensity of the heat and how prolonged it is," the Met Office's meteorologist Clare Nasir told Reuters.

Last year, Britain recorded its hottest-ever day when temperatures topped the 40 degrees Celsius mark for the first time, causing disruption to infrastructure like airports and railways and sparking wildfires.

Describing the latest record as bearing a "fingerprint of climate change," the Met Office said a study by its scientists had found the chance of June being hotter than 14.9 degrees Celsius had at least doubled since around 1940.

"Alongside natural variability, the background warming of the Earth's atmosphere due to human-induced climate change has driven up the possibility of reaching record high temperatures," said Paul Davies, Met Office climate extremes principal fellow and chief meteorologist.

Water use restrictions have been imposed in parts of southeastern England amid record demand for drinking water.

Meanwhile, Scotland has put regions on water scarcity alert due to concerns about the water level in its rivers and lochs.

The Met Office also said a marine heat wave affecting the North Atlantic had played an underlying role in raising land temperatures in Britain and said rainfall during June had been 68 percent of its average level.

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