A UK safety specialist is calling on managers across the country to make sure their workforce is properly protected from the sun.

Cheshire-based safety products manufacturer Safetyshop is reminding all businesses they only need to take simple steps to protect employees from harmful ultra violet rays this summer. Encouraging workers to cover up when they're outside and providing them with access to sun protection are easy measures to take, but they are often overlooked by British employers.

Employers have a legal responsibility to protect the health and safety of their workers, but there are also sound financial and business reasons for making sure workers are adequately protected from the sun's rays.

In southern hemisphere countries such as Australia, the slip, slop, slap campaign aimed at encouraging people to slip on a shirt, slop on some sunscreen and slap on a hat, has been running successfully for years. Safetyshop is now calling on UK employers to take note, and help protect their workers.

The company supplies businesses up and down the country with safety items from sun cream and lipscreen to solar control film for windows.

Bhavna Mistry, product marketing manager at Safetyshop, said: "We might live in the UK where the chances of a very sunny day are usually few and far between, but that doesn't mean the British workforce can afford to forget about the dangers of working outside.

"You are exposed to the risk of sunburn even on partly cloudy days so even though summer is still around the corner, now is the time to act and prepare for the warmer weather.

"A safer workforce is a healthier workforce, so as well as protecting themselves legally, companies that take sun protection seriously are helping safeguard productivity levels."

Safetyshop became a trading division of Stockport-based Brady Corporation Ltd following an acquisition in 2005. The company was established in 1970 and through various acquisitions of its own, Safetyshop has gone on to become the leading safety products manufacturer in the UK, producing a range of 18,000 products at its 34,000 square foot UK facility in Cheshire. Including workwear, fire extinguishers and safety signs among many other products.