For barbecue summer, read wellies washout

The Met Office is today telling us what every Briton knows: it was wrong to raise summertime hopes.

A revised forecast will point to more unsettled weather well into next month.

Meanwhile tourists and "staycation" Britons can only deride the Met Office predictions back in April, when it said the odds of a scorching summer were 65 per cent.

Unfortunately for the forecasters, and for us, the 35 per cent won through - with less sunshine, more rain, and the experts blaming the jet stream's whims.

The weather folk will point out there was hot weather in June and that Wimbledon barely needed its new Centre Court roof.

And at least we've avoided widespread summer floods - so far.

But another year for below-par holiday weather will raise questions about the accuracy and even the point of long-range predictions.

Today's UK forecast underlines the point: a formal warning of heavy rain in the south-west. But the summer might pop back in late August... it just might.