diff --git a/script/helpers.py b/script/helpers.py
index 0086a00e85..6ba093b413 100644
--- a/script/helpers.py
+++ b/script/helpers.py
@@ -421,7 +421,10 @@ def _get_github_event_data() -> dict | None:
     """
     github_event_path = os.environ.get("GITHUB_EVENT_PATH")
     if github_event_path and Path(github_event_path).exists():
-        with Path(github_event_path).open() as f:
+        # The event payload is UTF-8 JSON; without an explicit encoding
+        # Windows decodes it as cp1252 and any non ASCII byte (an ellipsis in
+        # a commit title is enough) raises UnicodeDecodeError.
+        with Path(github_event_path).open(encoding="utf-8") as f:
             return json.load(f)
     return None
 
diff --git a/tests/script/test_helpers.py b/tests/script/test_helpers.py
index 886d413ccf..43c4445dcf 100644
--- a/tests/script/test_helpers.py
+++ b/tests/script/test_helpers.py
@@ -79,6 +79,22 @@ def test_get_pr_number_from_github_env_event_file(
     assert result == "5678"
 
 
+def test_get_github_event_data_decodes_utf8_regardless_of_locale(
+    monkeypatch: MonkeyPatch, tmp_path: Path
+) -> None:
+    """The event payload is UTF-8; parsing must not depend on the platform
+    default encoding. On Windows the default is cp1252, which raised
+    UnicodeDecodeError as soon as a commit title carried non ASCII text."""
+    event_file = tmp_path / "event.json"
+    event_data = {"head_commit": {"message": "Answer UNPAIR with Response… é"}}
+    event_file.write_bytes(json.dumps(event_data, ensure_ascii=False).encode("utf-8"))
+    monkeypatch.setenv("GITHUB_EVENT_PATH", str(event_file))
+
+    result = helpers._get_github_event_data()
+
+    assert result == event_data
+
+
 def test_get_pr_number_from_github_env_no_pr(
     monkeypatch: MonkeyPatch, tmp_path: Path
 ) -> None: