The Quiet Bureaucrat Pulling the Strings Behind Britain's "Dodgy" State-Backed Weather and Climate Service

Meet Penelope Endersby, chief executive of the Meteorological Office (Met Office).

Penelope Endersby has led the Met Office since December 2018.

The agency operates as a trading fund under the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, supplying climate data that shapes government policy.

It manages hundreds of temperature stations across Britain, frequently cited in policy announcements, and serves as the UK's primary weather forecaster.

As a trading fund, it runs with financial autonomy, handling its own revenues and expenses outside the government’s main budget, allowing it to function more like a business.

Given its role in providing data-driven insights, you’d expect the Met Office to be rigorously objective. In reality, it is far from it.

Last December, journalist Ray Sanders uncovered through FOI requests that 103 of the 302 climate stations recording UK temperatures don’t actually exist.

By examining historical logs, he found that the ‘Braemar No. 2’ station in Aberdeenshire had supposedly been collecting data since 1959—despite only being installed in 2005.

What Sanders uncovered was the Met Office “merging” data from nearby sites to retroactively estimate temperatures.

He also found they were using similar methods for current recordings.

For example, Dover’s supposed weather station doesn’t exist. The nearest station is in Folkestone—except that doesn’t exist either. Yet, the Met Office still reports “precise” temperature data for both locations.

When Sanders confronted them, Endersby and her team admitted, “We use regression analysis to create a model of the relationship between each station and others in the network.”

Weeks later, after the revelation spread on social media, the Met Office quietly renamed the webpage that contained these recordings from “UK Climate Averages” to “Location-Specific Long-Term Averages.”

The page now states that its locations cover the UK evenly but don’t necessarily correspond to actual weather stations. No announcement. No explanation. Just a quiet edit that made it look as if it had always been that way.

In short, they’ve used questionable data to “evidence” heating claims, which the legacy media then repeated. Rather than addressing the issue, they quietly rebranded their methods without proper explanation.

Even where real temperature stations exist, their placements raise doubts about their accuracy. Some of Britain’s most alarming heat records come from locations surrounded by artificial heat sources.

In 2023, an “extreme” temperature was recorded at Teddington Bushy Park, where the measuring device sat beside a high wall reflecting heat and a newly built housing development.

Similarly, Chertsey’s highest summer temperature reading last June faced scrutiny when it was revealed that the device was located near a newly installed solar farm with over 1,800 panels—an obvious heat source.

Sanders confronted them again about the solar panels. Their response: “The temperature measurements meet standards for publication and scientific use.”

In September 2024, an FOI request revealed a brutal contrast in assessments. While international standards classify nearly 80% of Met Office weather stations as unreliable, the Met Office itself rates over 90% of them as “Excellent,” “Good,” or “Satisfactory.”

One of the most notorious examples of their “excellent” station standards came on July 19, 2022, when they announced that the UK had hit 40°C for the first time ever.

The reading was taken at RAF Coningsby, a military airbase, just as three fighter jets were landing nearby. The Met Office labelled the record as a “milestone in climate history.”

The BBC ran with the headline, ‘UK's 40C heatwave 'basically impossible' without climate change’.

Beyond station placement, the Met Office has been caught tampering with historical climate data (HadCRUT). Older readings from the mid-20th century have been lowered, while recent temperatures have been artificially increased.

They first adjusted the 1940s data by subtracting 0.15°C. Then, between 2000 and 2014, they revised HadCRUT’s original report of a 0.03°C per decade warming, raising it to 0.08°C. The latest version, HadCRUT5, now reports 0.14°C per decade.

The Met Office’s suspicious behaviour goes beyond quietly inserting disclaimers and ignoring concerns about station placements. They have also blocked FOI requests on more controversial activities.

In May last year, independent journalist Lewis Brackpool submitted FOI requests to seven government departments regarding the use of geo-engineering technologies.

The Met Office confirmed research into reflecting the Sun’s energy back into space, though only through simulations—meaning they were experimenting with models, not conducting real-world tests.

However, at the end of their response, they admitted to withholding some information because it was still “in the course of completion.” Their legal team claimed that releasing “incomplete data” could mislead the public, disrupt scientists, and “undermine the process of input and analysis.”

They also wrote of a “chilling effect” if news of certain activities emerged:

In theory, the Met Office could claim its research is ongoing indefinitely and refuse disclosure for all FOI requests in the future.

Most concerning of all, however, the Met Office admitted in their response to Brackpool’s FOIs that it has no oversight mechanism. It effectively governs itself.

The Met Office’s Hadley Centre supplies key climate data to the UK government. It contributes to reports like the UK Climate Projections (UKCP) and informs policies on carbon emissions, net-zero targets, and climate adaptation.

The Climate Change Committee (CCC), an “independent” advisory body, relies on Met Office data to shape recommendations on carbon budgets and climate resilience.

In short, Endersby’s Met Office sits at the heart of UK climate policy.

As climate blogger No Tricks Zone put it: “When the observations don’t fit the narrative, it is time to change the observations.”

In essence, Britain’s climate policies rest on a foundation of data so inaccurate and untrustworthy that it sometimes borders on fiction.

Endersby reportedly earns £130,000 a year, excluding bonuses, which have ranged from £5,000 to £10,000 in recent times.

Something tells me she wouldn’t want to compromise that wage…

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