Met Office on the hot seat. From the GWPF:
Liverpool Echo, 10 January 2011 by Ian Hernon
A LIVERPOOL MP is set to head a Parliamentary probe into this winter’s transport “fiasco.” Riverside’s Louise Ellman, as chairman of the Transport Select committee, has received official requests to launch a wide-ranging inquiry into why snowfalls up to the Christmas/New Year break crippled the rail and road system. If given the go-ahead it will focus on the coalition government’s alleged failure to respond to Met Office warnings of severe weather.
That led to weeks of turmoil with trains cancelled, motorways shut and thousands of travellers stranded in appalling weather.
Mrs Ellman has circulated complaints to committee members from all major parties and they will decide whether they merit a full-blown investigation.
She said: “The committee has not yet decided on an inquiry but it is certainly being considered.”
The demand for an inquiry was led by the all-party think tank, Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), which slammed the failures of both the Government and local authorities to prepare the transport system for the third severe winter in a row.
They said: “Lessons have to be learnt well in advance of the start of next winter so that we are much better prepared.”
The Met Office stated that it warned the Cabinet Office – in charge of emergency planning – in late October that the onset of winter would be “exceptionally cold.”
But their extreme weather warning was kept under wraps by ministers. The Cabinet Office has refused to reveal which, if any, local transport authorities, airports and utility companies were alerted.
GWPF director Benny Peiser said: “Not only is the lack of Government preparedness a cause for concern, but we wonder whether there may have been a reason – that ministers did not want to undermine preparations for the UN climate change conference in Cancun.” In a letter to Mrs Ellman, he said: “This year’s winter fiasco has severely damaged the British economy and our international reputation as a result of ill-preparedness.”
Ewan McCallum, chief metrologist at the Met Office, said an “amber” warning had been sent out as part of forward planning.
Liverpool Echo, 10 January 2011
See also: GWPF Letter to the House of Commons Transport Select Committee
The Global Warming Policy Foundation, 6 January 2011
London, 6 January: The Global Warming Policy Foundation has called on the House of Commons Transport Select Committee to set up a parliamentary inquiry into the winter advice the Government received by the Met Office and the renewed failure of both the Government and local authorities to prepare the UK transport system for the third severe winter in a row.
In a letter to the Chair of the Transport Committee, Louise Ellman, MP, the GWPF stresses that “Lessons have to be learned well in advance of the start of next year’s winter so that we are much better prepared if it is severe again.”
Full letter to Louise Ellman, MP
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Nice one, Smokey!
TFN Johnson says:
Michael (comment No 1), you yanks may be free and independent, but PLEEASE learn when to use ‘as’, and when ‘like’.
Perhaps you should be the one to learn? From the Oxford English Dictionary:
like, a., adv. (conj.), and n.
…
B. adv. (quasi-prep., conj.).
1. a. In or after the manner of; in the same manner or to the same extent as; as in the case of.
Given the above, Michael’s use of like in “Americans are not designed to be socially engineered like Europeans are” is correct.
I agree with Ralph: if you are going to invest somewhere cold, then do so in a place where the national services are going to tell you the truth, or a reasonable facsimile of it. If you can’t depend on fair warning about air and ground transport disruptions, how on earth can you compete in a just-in-time manufacturing world?
It does appear that Cancun’s weather was substituted in the minds at the Met office for real, punishing, British winters long they will apparently reign.
Heathrow is the most expensive (passenger tax) in the world, why pay more for the privilege of being lied to and cheated out of a fair warning?
Everyone from Grandma Moses to Piers Corbyn to Wooly Bear caterpillers is doing a better job than the Met Office.
This latest chapter of the ”hide decline” story or the “ 2010-2011 UK winter forecast” is so humorous that not even the best comedy writers could make it up better. Can anyone imagine a simple seasonal weather forecast becoming so overblown and ridiculous as to almost become a “national security risk” if it were possibly leaked to the public. One can imagine the next phase of this “hide the decline story” where the G8 or G20 call a special world meeting to discuss the latest Met Office seasonal forecast for UK. One might hear President turn to the Prime Minister and say, “Now Mr. Prime Minister what is the latest weather forecast for UK from the Met Office? Cold you say? Not cold again? Are you sure that it is safe to share this with the other world leaders? I have asked this matter to be classified as”top secret “and only you and I and the Met OFFICE will know the facts. The global warming myth must be protected at all cost”
All the comedy aside, the tragedy of all this is that millions of people where put into extreme hardship unnecessarily and some may have died as the result of possible inadequate warning and inadequate advance preparation. No one seemed or deemed it vital to warn the public as the first priority? Why not? How many more need to suffer in months and years ahead in UK until the message sinks in that we need to be better prepared for global cooling not global warming for the next 1-3 decades . If the last 3-4 cold[ two very extreme] winters have not convinced even the most stubborn of the possibility of extended for 10-30 years of cooling ahead, then they may have to learn this fact the hard way, but why should the rest of the people suffer because of this scientific or political stubbornness of few ?
Personally when I asked some colleagues at work they were completely oblivious that the MET were wrong in their prediction or at least now we have found out that they may truly have hid the cold weather during november from the public.
They don’t see it as a big deal unfortunately but we still need to share this information, less money on pretty looking models and more on current science and weather.
I think I might have the answer as to why government didn’t act upon its top secret covert “hide the forecast” operation and prepare for the upcoming severe winter:
They blew their entire year’s budget on global warming propaganda in getting the message out to the masses about drowning polar bears and starving prostitutes.
Oh where, oh where is the Monty Python troop when you need them ??
@Michael says: Wrote
January 10, 2011 at 9:19 am
“Yeah free to the extreme of anarchist ? I think social responsibility must be communal. Each person their own moral social agent turned America into a “Corporation Democracy”, me thinks you are confusing “free and independent” with subservience to the Corporation.”
No, not free to the “extreme” but rather, organized in an acceptable manner to all of us Americans. The US Constitution and its amendments are the law of the land. There has never been a better contract ever devised in mans history between the government and the governed. Too bad we let the globalist corporatocracy and socialists bastardize the way we are currently governed. We are beginning to reverse that trend and take our country back from the elitist thugs and global banking cartel. There are thousands of laws that need to be repealed in the process.
P.S.
Thanks for the grammar lessons all. Thank goodness I have a spell checker, still not perfect though.
Queue Monty Python song here:
“Oh I’m a Met faculty, and I’m okay”
“I compute all night and I sleeps all day”
Weird how several million Christmas Cards show Snow along with Holly, Robins etc every year and yet, for some reason, it all comes as a surprise!
Were they expecting it in August?
Surely the season predicates it and it is a matter of when and not if.
In which case, why did they not have either a plan or supplies of de-icer and rock salt?
Smokey says:
January 10, 2011 at 11:09 am
You’re not the only one bothered by the results of government education. See here.
==========================================================
LOL saved!
Darkinbad the Brightdayler says:
January 10, 2011 at 1:10 pm
Weird how several million Christmas Cards show Snow along with Holly, Robins etc every year and yet, for some reason, it all comes as a surprise!
Were they expecting it in August?
========================================================
Exactly, why bother with the loons at the Met or anywhere else? “I asked a climatologist and he told me snow was a thing of the past in England. So, I sold all of my snow shovels.”
I ask, who is more egregious, the one that told me utter nonsense, or me, the one that believed the nonsense and sold my snow preparation equipment? What’s wrong with the weather over there? It actually has to audacity to snow in the winter?
the farce continues…
10 Jan: Daily Mail: Virgin stands alone on BAA failures as it threatens to withhold airport fees
Virgin Atlantic has threatened to withhold airport fees from Heathrow operator BAA over its failure to cope with heavy snowfall, but has been left looking increasingly isolated as rivals failed to follow suit.
Chief executive Steve Ridgway – understood to be furious over the length of time Heathrow remained closed – said Virgin would withhold fees paid for parking and landing aircraft until an independent inquiry led by BAA nonexecutive director Sir David Begg is completed in March….
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/article-1345909/Virgin-stands-BAA-failures-threatens-withhold-airport-fees.html#ixzz1Afk9ptfD
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/article-1345909/Virgin-stands-BAA-failures-threatens-withhold-airport-fees.html
Well, its is expensive to be prepared for winter – some thing like £1000 per car for studded winter wheels . In a country which usually has 2 days of winter per year they dont buy winter wheels. Even if the tried, England cant come up with winter tiers for 20 million cars. They dont exist. 80 million winter tiers is not produced in fortnight.
So they can investigate all they want , it will happend again next time there is a prolonged period of snow in the U.K. as there is no economic justification to buy winter tiers for a normal year
Met Office on the hot seat. From the GWPF:
I don’t see the connection with the article:
If given the go-ahead it will focus on the coalition government’s alleged failure to respond to Met Office warnings of severe weather.
It would appear to be the Cabinet Office that is in the hot seat.
Lars, there is a difference between equiping English cars for Northern Canadian conditions and letting people have a heads up that they might want to get in extra supplies or revise their travel plans or stock up on grit and other things needed to survive short but extreme conditions. Just think of all those people who were stuck in airports, on stalled trains, or in cars because the Government, in their omniscient wisdom, felt it unnecessary to pass on a critical piece of information.
Just what is this preoccupation with the UK on this web site? The UK is a third world country now. I escaped the place in the 1960s, and where I live in Australia I am surrounded by British ex-pats who have all made the same move. They are mostly professionals, so perhaps if they had stayed in Britain it would not be the basket case it is now. I was an economic emigrant as I could not find a job to feed my family despite having professional qualifications. I had thought of a change of career but then thought ‘Why shuffle the deck chairs on the Titanic?” In hindsight it was the best move I ever made. Australia is fabulous.
It sounds as if a major disconnect from reality is occurring. All of the “authorities” were unprepared. The stores weren’t selling shovels, salt, sleds? Or were people just not buying? The transport grids of all stripes didn’t have a clue. It’s winter, as many have pointed out. Just the possibility of cold should have been enough for some sort of preparation. You can always pack everything away for next time. The statement, No battle plan survives contact with the enemy, at least infers a plan existed.
It’s really hard to push the global warming hoax, when the planet is up to their arses in snow. More popcorn, going to be quite a show.
“Lars says:
January 10, 2011 at 2:16 pm
Well, its is expensive to be prepared for winter – some thing like £1000 per car for studded winter wheels . ”
It shouldn’t need to be that expensive unless prices in the UK are unreasonable. Snow tires without studs would probably be enough in the UK, and two sets of tires – one winter and one summer – will last a lot longer than a single set, further decreasing the cost.
In addition there is a much cheaper alternative if you only need the extra traction occasionally: snow chains. They are reasonably simple to install and fairly cheap (30-60 pounds for a set, in Sweden at least). Of course you are then limited to 20-30 mph, but that’s a lot better than zero.
LARS
You said
“Well, its is expensive to be prepared for winter – some thing like £1000 per car for studded winter wheels . In a country which usually has 2 days of winter per year they dont buy winter wheels. Even if the tried, England cant come up with winter tiers for 20 million cars. They dont exist. 80 million winter tiers is not produced in fortnight.”
I agree that snow tires are expensive .
It depends what one calls a normal year. What was norm ten years ago may no longer apply now. If we are headed for several decades of cooler weather, like the last 2 Decembers, colder winters could come 65% of the time like they did during the last colder spell in UK [1962-1987 ]
Decembers have already been cooling in CENTRAL ENGLAND since 2006
year december temp[C]
2006 6.5
2007 4.9
2008 3.5
2009 3.1
2010 -0.7
One either adapts or faces a crisis over and over again
Lars;
tiers are layered. Tires are round.
I note that the MET, even in its lame excuse-making, is trying to stretch “onset of winter” to imply it forecast a cold winter overall. It probably was talking about the 1st 2 or 3 weeks.
Sun Spot… one difference in corporate control and government control is that the government enforces its will at the point of a gun. You can quit the corporation, but you can’t quit the government. As in the Civil War in America, the government will kill you before it will let you leave.
Michael said:
The US Constitution and its amendments are the law of the land. There has never been a better contract ever devised in mans history between the government and the governed.
———————————————————————–
Not useful to the discussion, but a good example of the arrogance of some US citizens, which so unfailingly alienates people everywhere else in the world.
It will be interesting to watch this one, because there are some very powerful players (the Cabinet Office, the Cabinet, and the AGW alarmists) potentially in conflict to avoid blame. No doubt everyone’s first instinct will be to sweep it under the carpet. Please don’t let it happen, UK skeptics and anyone who suffered damage because of this debacle!
Lars says:
January 10, 2011 at 2:16 pm
Well, its is expensive to be prepared for winter
===========================================
Lars, the police, ambulances, hospitals, food, water, medicines, fuel……
…the news reported over 30,000 people died
My guess is that reality goes like this:
1 – Having been caught several times before, the Met Office refuses to give an ‘official’ winter prediction
2 – When asked by journalists individual Met Office staff give their usual ‘It’ll be hot’ asides.
3 – At some stage the Cabinet Office asked for an internal technical met report. This came with probability bands of various kinds, which can be interpreted in any way you like. It was not for publication anyway, and the Cabinet Office never used it…
4 – When the Met Office started getting stick for the cold winter, someone claimed that one interpretation of that internal met report was that it might be cold (prob = 10%). So they DID get the forecast right….
5 – The press decide to interpret this as a major incident…..