The BBC has dumped the Met Office apparently to cut costs telling us that ‘”Our viewers get the highest standard of weather service and that won’t change. We are legally required to go through an open tender process and take forward the strongest bids to make sure we secure both the best possible service and value for money for the licence fee payer.”
So the Met Office doesn’t provide the best possible service? Surely that must be the conclusion…..or is the BBC saying they may provide the best possible service but are too expensive….in which case you have to ask what does the BBC consider more important…an accurate service or a cheap one?
Perhaps this is politics by the BBC…..they are in negotiations with the government for charter renewal and the subsequent shape, size and scope of the BBC are up for grabs and the BBC is not above making dramatic public statements in order to try and pressurize the government in the ongoing PR battle…
Lord Hall threatened to overshadow Budget after TV licence row by saying he would close BBC2
So is the high profile move to dump the Met Office a genuine attempt to cut costs and improve the service or is this just another highly political tactic by the BBC to strong arm the government into backing down on any attempts to rein in the BBC?
The BBC playing politics? Not in their DNA, apparently.
Also not sure this gesture is going to impact much outside their bubble, like most other of their machinations.
This policy was the result of a directive from Lord Hall Hall.
Lord Hall Hall (sorry for the plagiarism Alan) is a genuine traitor, an up to the minute, fashionable traitor.
Unlike the traitors of yesteryear, who lived in hovels, wore long, grubby cloaks, emerged only after dark, with spherical IEDs in hand, having a smouldering fuse.
These traitors of yesteryear helped in their self-identification by writing BOMB on the devices they carried, as an aide memoire.
The Hall Halls of today mingle their spoor with the normal animals so that the admixture of scents (the Hall Halls like admixtures) would prevent even Ray Mears from identifying them.
Nevertheless there are subtle signs by which these dregs of the UK may be recognised.
#1 They are cross eyed. This is due to having, since conception, been taught to look down their noses at the inferior beings who are fortunate enough to share the UK with their infalliblenesses.
#2 They have trouble breathing normally. This is due to having
nostrils (see also #5) almost permanently closed, having been
taught, since conception, to anticipate, and avoid, the unpleasant
effluvium produced by white van men.
#3 They are superb swimmers. This is due to having superior
buoyancy, the reason for this buoyancy will be evident if viewing
their heads parallel with their long, drooping ears. Looking into
one of their ears daylight is observed through the other.
#4 Their eyes are positioned at the sides of their heads, this is a
superb Darwinian adaptation which enables them to detect
predators while they adopt their unusual feeding position.
#5 They have been domesticated so long that they are unable to
feed naturally like their cousins in the wild. They are only able to
derive nutrients placed in cuboid containers which they suck up
with their extended snouts, whilst simultaneously looking both
downwards and sidewards.
#6 Hall Halls, also known by their Linnaean name of Turdus
Maximus Perpetualis Niggerus Arsekissius, are the only species
who sleep in beds, beds that, like all their other possessions, of
sumptuous magnificence, opulence and luxury. As they deserve.
Hall Halls receive more, and larger inheritances from their
owners than any other pets. Little wonder then, that they are the
wealthiest non-human species alive.
#7 Hall Halls are the only species recognised, by the IUCN as being
“of no value whatsoever and may be killed on sight”. The only
species so classified in the IUCN Red Book, no, not that red book.
So there you are, if you see a Hall Hall in the flesh put it out of our misery.
Why do I have to edit in a space the size of a postage stamp when the display is the size of Wembley Stadium?
You’re right. I’ve made the comment box bigger. Hopefully this won’t cause any new problems…
RM
You have, indeed, and I have thanked you in another thread, before I returned here.
I shall keep a harpoon at the ready.
They could do a lot worse than engage Piers Corbyn, and his Weather Action outfit – they have consistently more success than the Met Office ever did, and are very anti AGW (so I suppose that fact alone, would lose them brownie points with the BBC).
Who needs the television weather service anyway? The same information is available from the Met Office website (actually more detailed than the TV reports, and the same as the data repackaged by the BBC for their website). The Met Office website will still be available after the BBC move to another data provider, so who needs the BBC service? TV weather involves a lot of swirling images giving you brief mentions of the weather in Dungeness, Dunstable and Dunfermeline, when all you really want to know is what the weather will be throughout the day wherever you are going to be.
The synopsis for the week ….
The EU is falling apart, Labour is falling apart and the BBC is falling apart.
I use MSN Weather which came free with my laptop. It gives local forecasts on an hourly basis and so far has been very accurate. For all I know it may be based on Met Office data. But just think of the money the BBC could save on weather forecasters alone. There seem to be hundreds of them. God knows how many backroom staff there are.
Are the weather forecast presenters employed by the BBC or the Met Office and provided as part of the service cost?
I thought the latter, but could be wrong.
Mallard, You may be right although it seems from the BBC website, it is a bit of a mixture although the wording is typically unclear. Either way, I bet their are some tax avoidance schemes involved !
All the proper forecasters , work for the Met Office , there are other presenters , mainly on regional news programmes ,who are `trained `to present a forecast . They also use ,stand in presenters on Look East ,from Weather Quest , based in Norwich , when the `trained` presenters are off .Paul Hudson , should be ok as he is “freelance” on Look North .The Proper Met Office Forecasters , could , work at RAF airfields & airports ,& volunteer to do tv work .
At least it may give Carol more time to spend with her make-up kit and jitterbug trainer
If Carol goes how am I going to continue my education into the animal World ? One of her brilliant outside broadcast on a hot day from the penguin enclosure at London Zoo (think they are trying to gets us thinking about Global warming and melting ice and the poor polar bears or something) she asked the audience if they knew where Rockhopper penguins got their name from well I for one had no clue. Apparently it is because they hop on rocks.Carol I will miss you
Personally I’ll miss her jugs.
Brilliant news.
Whilst the Met Office squanders £millions prognosticating ‘climate’ at the expense of accuracy of weather, then the loss of BBC funds can only help rein-in Met Office profligacy.
There are many private companies who can provide what is needed. Weather forecasts.
I don’t bother with the Met office forecasts anyway. I find seaweed and pine cones more reliable. A throbbing bunion is a definite sign of an imminent storm.
I always wondered why the BBC website went big on weather when surely it only repeats Met Office information (as from same source). So in future the BBC will have an excuse for retaining the service.
Tit for tat …. The government cuts the BBC funds received from the TV tax so the BBC cuts the income received by the government Met Office, requiring the Met Office to make cuts elsewhere or demand more support from general taxation
No, your tv license is as the BBC demands, nothing to do with government.
Aren’t the Met Office and the BBC both government bodies ?
Is it war between them, or is it all ‘smoke and mirrors’ with their funding ?
Does this mean that the Government should be required to seek competitive tenders for the broadcast channels currently occupied by the BBC?
Should the BBC be asked to interview for its old job?
The moment ‘unique’ gets dusted off again.
According to the DT the two runners are Dutch and New Zealand organisations.