Convincing statistical proof has emerged over the last year to show that the UK Met Office is inflating maximum temperature readings to create Net Zero-supporting climate alarm. Over the last 30 years, the Met Office has produced the vast majority of its data from unnaturally heat-ravaged ‘junk’ sites using newly-installed accurate electronic devices able to record one minute heat spikes. The independent researcher Dr Eric Huxter has taken a year to examine the unnatural sudden rises that supply many daily ‘records’, and compared the overall spike averages with a pristine CIMO Class 1 control station. He concludes that it “could well explain the step change in rate of temperature change, and the marked increase in the step of new daily maximum records since 1990”.
During his year-long project, Dr Huxter examined 340 daily maximum temperature highs recorded across 96 Met Office stations and discovered that these sites showed average short heat spikes around 1.1°C. Most of these spikes occurred around daily ‘records’ in junk CIMO Class 3, 4 and 5 locations. These sites have internationally recognised ‘uncertainties’ or possible errors of 1°C, 2°C and 5°C respectively. But spikes in temperature can occur naturally, so Huxter consulted a full year of individual minute temperature figures at a pristine Class 1 site in open farmland at Rothamsted. From the purchased records – a total of 525,541 – he was able to compile a baseline probability control.
Here is the kicker – comparing the Rothamsted control with the 360 heat spikes at the largely junk sites, a chi-square test showed a highly significant difference of p <0.0001. This means that if there were truly no difference between the sites, the chances of observing such a large discrepancy in heat spikes would be less than one in 10,000 – in other words, more unlikely than one in 10,000 and quite possibly far smaller – for example, one in 100,000.
Using such obviously flawed data, the Met Office’s Chief Scientist Professor Stephen Belcher calls for Net Zero to “stabilise the climate”, reporting that between 2014-2023 the number of days recording 28°C in the UK had more than doubled, while those over 30°C had tripled compared to 1961-1990. The BBC’s Chief Climate Headbanger Justin Rowlatt adds even more to the gaiety of the nation by reporting a Met Office claim that there has been a 40% increase in “pleasant days”, and these are defined as 20°C and above. “These changes may sound positive, but the UK’s shifting climate represents a dangerous upheaval for our ecosystems as well as our infrastructure”, he extrapolates.
The daily maximum high, along with the minimum low, is a key number in calculating average temperatures and is behind the Met Office’s ubiquitous claims of ‘hottest ever’ days. If the automated sensors, which move much quicker than the old liquid-in-glass thermometers, catch brief exaggerated spikes rather than true ambient air temperatures, then the outlier information will end up corrupting all the daily, monthly, annual and decadal averages. Eventually some of this information will end up in global datasets and will help exaggerate the rate of recent cyclical global warming.
Extreme examples of heat spikes are not uncommon. On May 1st last year, the Met Office claimed its station in Kew Gardens recorded a temperature at 2.59pm of 29.3°C. Promoted by the BBC, this was said to be the highest temperature ever recorded for this day in the UK. But the temperature was a massive 2.6°C higher than that recorded at 2pm and no less than 0.76°C above the figure recorded a minute later on the hour. Minute-by minute changes in temperature would not have been picked up in the past, and it is for that reason that the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) recommends averaging electronic measurements over five minutes to standardise data and minimise short-tern ‘noise’. For some inexplicable reason, despite playing a major part in WMO deliberations, the Met Office does not appear to want to follow this sensible scientific advice.
At the Rothamsted control site, the vast majority of the half a million readings vary minute-to-minute with individual differences in a range between –0.15 to 0.25°C. Most of the individual changes from the previous hour were to be found between –0.35°C and 0.45°C. As the graph below shows, the majority of the readings in this band showed considerably less divergence from the hourly recordings.
It is hardly a surprise that heat spikes blot the Met Office’s temperature collection programme throughout almost all its nationwide network. A recent Freedom of Information request by the Daily Sceptic revealed that Classes 4 and 5 have increased significantly over the last 18 months, and now total an appalling 80.6% of the entire network of nearly 400 stations. Pristine Class 1 sites such as Rothamsted with no uncertainties are just 4.9% of the total, and in the last 18 months they have fallen in number from 24 to 19.
But what is worse is that the Met Office does not appear to appreciate the scale of its problem, with higher class sites blighted by unnatural heat sources whether it be from jet aircraft, main roads, solar farms, electricity sub stations or tall glass-clad buildings. Little effort seems to have been made to improve matters. Over the last 18 months, 20 new sites appear to have been opened with an astonishing 67.7% starting life in the Class 4/5 junk lane. Why on earth would a reputable science body do that, some might ask. Conspiracy enthusiasts are unlikely to be short of uncomfortable suggestions.
The importance of Huxter’s work in bringing clarity and reality to the Met Office temperature claims should not be underestimated. His work makes it crystal clear – the UK Met Office does not possess a nationwide temperature measuring network that is capable of determining daily, monthly or annual highs and averages to within one hundredth of a degree Centigrade. Neither should it be using these data for the temperature computer modelling it does at non-existent sites using ‘well-correlated neighbouring stations’. Much of its temperature measuring effort is corrupted by figures that give a fake reading of true ambient air temperature. It has allowed its network to become corrupted over the years with urban heat and it has failed to make allowances for changes in measuring devices. Activists at the organisation should stop weaponising all these dodgy data for political Net Zero purposes, or the good name of the Met Office, built up over decades since Victorian times, runs the risk of becoming severely tarnished.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor. Follow him on X.
“But what is worse is that the Met Office does not appear to appreciate the scale of its problem”.
Those in charge of the Met Office which is state owned do not really care about correct data. They just pretend they do. It is mostly involved in accurate weather forecasts and Climate Change messaging, both of which they are pretty good at and it goes out to the general public that has no particular interest in more complicated matters.
The Met is quite often challenged and actually does some corrections but the Climate messaging in essense stays the same. Nothing ever changes..
The Bureau of Meteorology in Straya don’t let thermometer location get in the way of a good hot-day beat-up.
That’s surely an April Fool’s?
“city needs a weather station in the centre of town for accurate records “
Did you not notice that the investigator is “Dr Eric Huxter”? (Huckster?). Think about it…
What an astute observation. Your point is?
Sounds like a name made up to sound like something else. Call it a pun if you like.
I have had that surname from birth, thank you for your interest in the science.
the Met Office does not appear to appreciate the scale of its problem.
What problem? As far as the Met Office is concerned people like Dr Huxter, Ray Sanders etc are irritants that can be silenced for the most part by their media friends who crave the next climate doom headline. And if it gets retracted, it’s glossed over; the headline message stands.
You certainly won’t catch the BBC reporting on the latest Met Office scandal, no, it will be… glossed over
The Scandal of the Scottish Met Office Station Still Providing Temperature Figures Six Decades After it Closed – Daily Sceptic
The Met Office’s troubles are not going away.
Following a short sabbatical I am now resuming the Surface Stations Project. – Tallbloke’s Talkshop
There will only be a problem for the Met Office come the next election.
No conspiracy is required. They are part of the giant machine of the Climate Industrial Complex, and are simply doing their part. But not for long. The sands of truth and reality have gotten into the machinery. Oops.
Here’s the kicker. They want you to stop kicking.
Here’s the kicker.
Nike Slides Towards Disaster as Stock Plummets Following Woke Rebrand
https://dailysceptic.org/2026/04/02/nike-slides-towards-disaster-as-stock-plummets-following-woke-rebrand/
Bad approach. Had Nike inserted strategically placed question marks, the message would have been much different.
Can’t win. So win.
or
Can’t win? So win.
Likely not as good as it could be but better than what was done.
Bud Lite and Jaguar – blinded by the virtue.
I do not always dress up like Audrey Hepburn, but when I do I prefer to drink Bud Light. Stay quirky, my friends.
Play it again, Sam.
“blinded by the virtue.”
No shit.
You don’t need conspiracy if there is an abundance of parasites and opportunists inside the system and money to be made by following the narrative.
Not only must we deal with record temperature spikes, we also must survive record temperature averages as well. On a weather website today there’s a map of “record high month if March”, in the US southwest. I live within one of the bright red dots on the map. We certainly had a great March. It was sunny and warm all month, but according to the reports I saw, not a single day hit a record high. We apparently had a “record” month, but it happened without a single record high being set in the entire month.
Statistics, like computers don’t like.
But liars can make statistics (and computers) say whatever the liars want.
If you torture the data long enough, it will tell you anything.
Figures don’t lie, but liars figure.
I think that was the Droid you were looking for. 😉
For a UK temperature check, I went to:
https://www.extremeweatherwatch.com/countries/united-kingdom/average-temperature-by-year.
The Thi and the Tlo temperature data from 1901 to 2024 are displayed in a long table. Here is the temperature data for these two dates:
Year——-Thi——-Tlo——-Tav Temperatures ° C
2024——12.9——6.9——-9.9
1901——11.8——4.7——-8.2
Change–+1.1—-+2.2——+1.7
CO2 Concentration Data:
2024: 424 ppmv (0.82 g CO2/cu. m. of air)
1901: 295 ppmv (0.58 g CO2/cu. m. of air)
After 123 years the UK is slightly warmer and has exceeded the 2015 Paris Agreement of 1.5° C by 0.2 ° C. Note how little CO2 there is in the air. Note also the larger increase in Tlo. There is really no need for Net Zero by 2050. A few degrees of warming is beneficial for the UK.
Extreme Weather Watch uses temperature, weather and climate data from NOAA’s and CRU’s data bases. Be sure to go to the home page at:
https://www.extremeweatherwatch.com. There are links in light blue to data from all the weather stations in the aforementioned data bases.
The distribution in the figure looks like a Lorenz distribution. Just saying ….
But…. “It’s got electrolytes.” (with associated hand wave)
— Idiocracy
But… “We’ve got parasites.” (with associated subsidies)
— Reality
Hi-5
The truth is getting its pants on, slowly and methodocally against the warming bias industrial complex.
“ ‘well-correlated neighbouring stations’”
Correlation does *not* ensure accuracy.
If climate science would follow even the most basic rule of statistical descriptors (that both the mean and standard deviation are the minimum requirements to understand the data) and provide the standard deviation of their data all the way up the averaging hierarchy the effect of the quicker responding sensors would become embarrassingly obvious.
That and (Tmax-Tmin)/2 = not the mean.
This “convincing statistical proof” appears to come from an obscure blog post by a retired geography teacher in August 2025.
Here’s his “conclusion”
“My conclusions from this study is that the Meteorological Office, in its public face, if [sic] providing an [sic] misleading picture of UK maximum temperatures, which support its role in ‘feeding the fear’ of weather (and climate) in an urban population.”
You can see he wasn’t and English teacher.
So, feel free to pick on the grammar all you want but, can you find any fault with the conclusions?
Or are you simply trying to denigrate the messenger??
Conclusions based on the records of a single site using statistical techniques that may or may not be valid by a ‘blogger’ 8 months ago and that no one lese has picked up on in all that time?
Does this denigrate “the messenger”?
Yes, yes it does. You have made no concrete criticism of the statistical techniques at all. If those techniques are “may or may not” it is up to choose which before criticizing the conclusion.
Like it or not, if one station is being used to show how wrong a process is, then there is a good chance that it occurs in data from other stations. It is up to you to show counter examples in order to disprove this false.
Good luck.
You totally ignore the fact that Class 4 and 5 stations, the two lowest classes, now total over 80% of all the Met Office sites and that “pristine class 1 sites” are under 5% of the total at 19. Even the Met Office says Class 5, which number 30% of sites are “undesirable”.
The WMO say class 5 sites can have “additional uncertainties of up to 5C” and class “4 up to 2C”
I was just pointing out that the source of the story is highly suspect.
He has his own wee blog and he doesn’t submit his “conclusions” for peer review and the whole thing looks highly amateurish.
But you carry on.
As a nonenglish autodidact I have a question, Mr English teacher.
What does “wasn ‘t and English teacher” even mean (you probably ain’t an English teacher too).
You’re right there.
That’s ok. We can see you’re not a statistician, or a scientist.
Never said I was.
But I can see a silly old fool when I read one.
(Takes one to know one!)
Thank you for spotting these errors, now corrected.
Eric, I read through these comments when I get a chance and respond to each in turn (when I can) without necessarily reading them all in one go.
Reading you’re reply here just now I must apologise for referring to you as “a silly old fool”,
You’re obviously not that, since you have made the corrections. It still applies to me, though.
I’m not saying I agree with your conclusions (I don’t – insufficient data) but it’s a pointed reminder for me to keep things civil.
Best.
“your” long day….
Thank you. I have been monitoring these figures for almost a year, therefore the data are building up.
From 26/04/2025 Data from 102 Weather Stations with 373 Temperature Maxima (340 UK Daily Maximum) averaging 3.7 per station.
Of these readings 220 (59%) have a known time (to the minute GMT) that Maximum Temperature was recorded, 135 (60.3%) occurring before the published maximum hourly reading.
The mean temperature spike above the Previous Hour is 1.23°C with a 7.5% probability of occurring at a CIMO 1 site.
For all readings the average spike above Maximum/Previous Hour is 1.07°C with a 9.1% probability of occurring at a CIMO1 site.
Given that 64.7% happen on/before Maximum hour the average spike for all dates without a known time taken from hour before the maximum is 1.7°C with a 2.9% probability.
Minute to minute changes show similar low probabilities, although these data are incomplete as there are only two data points to work from.
I understand that you are happy with the Meteorological Office’s expertise but my conclusion, for what it is worth, is that these are locally induced spikes (reflected in the CIMO rating) that will bias the national record (60.9% have <1 in 6 chance of happening at Rothamsted [CIMO] 1) no matter how much homogenisation is practised.
You have not addressed a single substantive point the author has made. He could be right or wrong, but you don’t seem to have even considered his argument. It does not matter where he has published, if at all, whether he is old or young, retired or in employment, what his professional field is or was.
These are all lazy and stupid ways of dismissing the argument without having had to work your way through it. You might as well judge his piece on how tall or short he is, where he was born, his sex, the color of his skin, the religion of his parents.
The only thing that matters is the cogency of his reasoning. To dismiss his arguments on the grounds you have chosen to use destroys your own credibility. Its not about being uncivil, though certainly that. Its about being closed minded and stupid with it.
Read the piece, explain specifically what you find questionable in the argument. Put this another way: stop trolling, because that’s all it is at the moment.
100%
Bravo!
“You can see he wasn’t
andan English teacher.”Neither were you, apparently.
Absolutely not, no. I’m not publishing nonsense on blogs either.
Sure you are. Constantly, in fact.
There are only so many tricks available to create the trend. After 40 years, I hope a group of motivated phds would have thought of all them all. New researchers could ignore 1980-2020. If official sources have revised the past beyond recognition, then some thesis from pre-1980 probably contains the original data in an appendix.
“the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) recommends averaging electronic measurements over five minutes to standardise data ….. the Met Office does not appear to want to follow this sensible scientific advice.”
That is not the case…..
https://connectsci.au/es/article/69/1/172/73446/A-comment-on-temperature-measurement-at-automatic
” (World Meteorological Organization 2014, p. 49).
The rationale behind the guidance regarding both the time constant and output averaging time is explained in a number of locations in the document. For example on p. 540 Section 1.3.2.4 entitled Instantaneous meteorological values contains the statements:
The natural small-scale variability of the atmosphere, the introduction of noise into the measurement process by electronic devices and, in particular, the use of sensors with short time-constants make averaging a most desirable process for reducing the uncertainty of reported data…. atmospheric pressure, air temperature, air humidity, sea-surface temperature, visibility, among others, be reported as 1 to 10 min averages…. These averaged values are to be considered as the ‘instantaneous’ values of meteorological variables for use in most operational applications and should not be confused with the raw instantaneous sensor samples or the mean values over longer periods of time required from some applications. One-minute averages, as far as applicable, are suggested for most variables as suitable instantaneous values
It is instructive to review practices by which other meteorological services produce their 1-min ‘instantaneous’ values of air temperature. The US National Weather service has measurement system specifications of a 25-s time constant, with uncertainty of ±1% at 95% confidence at 50°F (10°C) and ±2% at 90% confidence at 120°F (~49°C). Current air temperature, minimum air temperature and maximum air temperature are reported at 1-min intervals based on 15 s averaging (National Weather Service 2014).”
So, classic old style thermometer temperature measurements using the same method and location could/ should indicate a difference if there is one, w a slight calibration of the equipment due to the passing of time
Change the method and/ or location and your comparison does not fly, by default.
It doesnt really matter if the interval is 5, 15 or 30 minutes, as long as you use an average in which the spikes do not overly skew the results.
I dont know the interval at which old thermometer readings were made. 1 hour?
But the spikes that we get w 1 minute electronic devices will most certainly lead to ‘record temperatures’ in certain locations. There is the anomaly right there.
And a 1 minute average of 15 second intervals is too short for the spike to level out.
“And a 1 minute average of 15 second intervals is too short for the spike to level out.”
That may, or may not, be the case, however the WMO is happy at 1 minute averaging of 60 readings and it is not what Morrison stated, which was my point.
Classic mig thermometers were a one measurement only method as one had to walk to the Stevenson screen to record it (impractical at most stations especially airports).
Possible parallax error included.
A maximum themo is generally read at 2100 GMT (and shaken down to reset).
BTW: I was using them at an RAF base in 1974 (the year I joined the UKMO).
So any supposed bias from them goes back at least 52 years !
To the myth regarding the WMO classification of UK weather station siting means they are “bunk”. ….
“WMO Statement on UK Met Office Observations and Siting Classification
https://community.wmo.int/site/knowledge-hub/programmes-and-initiatives/instruments-and-methods-of-observation-programme-imop/siting-classification
Prof. Celeste Saulo, Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization, expresses her appreciation to the UK’s Met Office for the free exchange of high quality observations and data, and its commitment to international meteorological cooperation and trust. Prof.Saulo emphasizes that the siting classification does not reflect the quality or suitability of the stations for weather and climate monitoring, but rather it provides scientists with information about the ability of the stations to represent the area in which the observations are made.”
https://weather.metoffice.gov.uk/learn-about/how-forecasts-are-made/observations/observation-site-classification
“WMO Siting Classifications were designed with reference to a wide range of global environments and the higher classes can be difficult to achieve in the more-densely populated and higher latitude UK. For example, the criteria for a Class 1 rating for temperature suits wide open flat areas with little or no human influenced land use and high amounts of continuous sunshine reaching the screen all year around, however, these conditions are relatively rare in the UK. Mid and higher latitude sites will, additionally, receive more shading from low sun angles than some other stations globally, so shading will most commonly result in a higher CIMO classification – most Stevenson Screens in the UK are class 3 or 4 for temperature as a result but continue to produce valid high-quality data. WMO guidance does, in fact, not preclude use of Class 5 temperature sites – the WMO classification simply informs the data user of the geographical scale of a site’s representativity of the surrounding environment – the smaller the siting class, the higher the representativeness of the measurement for a wide area. Indeed, it should be noted that WMO Class 5 is not the same as a Met Office ‘Unsatisfactory’ inspection assessment, which ultimately determines the ongoing use of a site. We use the Met Office grading system to determine record verification because; it has historical relevance, covering a wide range of long-standing criteria at UK observation sites, the equipment, and the exposure in a holistic manner and has clear meaning to what is acceptable or not. It tells us how much confidence we have in the data and permits comparisons.
In short England is geographically(highish latitude) and developmentally (2000 years of it) complicated with approaching 57 ml peeps on the land area of Alabama (5ml peeps), and classes 3-5 are generally all that can be achieved as a result.
All I read here is bureaucratic bull snot that basically is saying poorly sited station provide readings that are good enough for government work. No mention of them being satisfactory for scientific research in either accuracy, precision, resolution, or uncertainty.
I note:
Population England 2026: 70M
“As of early 2026, the total land area of England is approximately 130,279 to 130,310 square kilometers (roughly 50,301 square miles).”
70M/130k should get population density 538 people/sqkm
Same search AI gives a smaller number:
“As of 2026, England remains the most densely populated country in the UK, with a population density of approximately 434 people per square kilometer.”
Conversion 1.076e7 sqft per 1 sqkm
Each English person, if evenly distributed across the surface of England, would occupy about 25k sqft. They’d be standing with the next person 300 ft to their North, East, South and West.
I was going to gripe “that’s not too dense to put a thermometer” or add a qualification like “most of the time the English do not stand in an evenly distributed grid”, but instead I have to concede – England is very densely populated from an Amewrican perspective. In USA’s Alaska you would not see the nearest gridded human even with binoculars.
Still advocating the use of junk, fake and heavily urban affected data.. well done.:-)
(when it is all you have, guess that’s all you can do)
And yes, most warming in the UK is from population growth.. well done.
Thank you for your detailed post.
I dont know why all the downvotes because you seem to supply background information.
I think that people here push the downvote button intuitively when they dont like what the information provides or the direction.
Not simply because it’s wrong.
It’s quite common.
Risk of becoming?! The Met office is already a bad joke, already taken over by advocacy by anti-science idiots like many formerly highly regarded scientific “bodies” and institutions.
The Met Office’s overstatement of temperatures isn’t just in measured ones, but in forecast ones too. Virtually every morning, when I look at the local forecast, the predicted high for the day is a degree C higher than any of the individual hourly forecasts. How can this be?
Not so good at forecasting.
So far in 2026 of 91 Maximum readings to date:
3.3% within +/- 0.5°C of Maximum UK Forecast (forecast to nearest degree)
96.7% >0.5°C above Maximum UK Forecast
0.0%<-0.5°C below Maximum UK Forecast
Mean anomaly from Maximum UK Forecast is +2°C
Mean anomaly from Maximum Regional Forecast is +2.7°C
This the most depressing thing about this piece is this:
the Met Office’s Chief Scientist Professor Stephen Belcher calls for Net Zero to “stabilise the climate”, reporting that between 2014-2023 the number of days recording 28°C in the UK had more than doubled, while those over 30°C had tripled compared to 1961-1990.
The Met Office Chief Scientist really thinks that UK Net Zero will have any effect at all on the UK climae, the global climate or on UK temperatures?
The UK is governed by scientific illiterates with no ability to reason, who think they are experts, and are generally regarded as such.
There’s no risk of their reputation *becoming* severely tarnished, it’s been nothing but finely powdered iron oxide since “climategate”.
Fewer heat-related deaths in 2025 despite warmest summer.”Around 1,504 heat-associated deaths were reported in England, according to UKHSA, roughly half the 3,039 predicted.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy91xqxn2jdo