Paul Homewood criticizes a BBC Weather article from February 2, 2026, headlined “January rainfall in parts of UK breaks more than century- long record.”

The BBC report stated that regions like Northern Ireland, south- west and southern England, and east of Scotland had one of their wettest Januarys on record, with Northern Ireland seeing its wettest in 149 years and some local stations (e.g., in Cornwall and Aberdeenshire) recording exceptionally high totals, often 70-300% above average in spots.

The BBC’s reporting aligns with Met Office provisional data released around that time, which confirmed unusually wet conditions in many areas, some setting local records, others ranking among the top few historically, but not universally the absolute wettest ever in the named regions.

The Met Office and BBC often note that while individual years vary due to natural factors (like a southerly jet stream in this case), the trend toward wetter UK winters matches climate model expectations.

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The climate scaremongers: BBC reports about January rainfall are awash with lies

From The Conservative Woman

By Paul Homewood

GIVEN the media hype, you might think our weather had never been as wet as it was last month.

The BBC, true to form, came up with the headline ‘January rainfall in parts of UK breaks more than century-long record’. Their report went on to state: ‘Northern Ireland, South West and Southern England, and the east of Scotland all had one of their wettest Januarys on record.’

True to form, they were lying. In none of the regions mentioned were any records set. January 1877 remains the wettest January on record in Northern Ireland, while in the South West and Southern England, January 2026 ranked 12^th and 6^th wettest respectively. It was also very wet in East Scotland last month, but it still ranked only 9^th.

Across the UK as a whole, it was not exceptionally wet at all – January 1928 still tops the list:

January is, of course, only one month of the year. When all months are taken into account, we can see that even in Northern Ireland it was not unusually wet last month. Indeed, it was only the wettest month since 2020. But that does not make for scary headlines.

One of the worst affected areas this year was Devon and Cornwall, with totals of more than ten inches in places including Torbay. That is certainly a rare event, but again not unprecedented.

In November 1929, for example, there were higher totals, and not just in Devon and Cornwall. Rainfall across most of Wales was even greater and the English Midlands and North West were also exceptionally wet:

Met Office Monthly Weather Reports

Over the UK as a whole, rainfall in November 1929 was 30 per cent higher than last month. Moreover, believe it or not, the following month, December, was even wetter. The four-month period from October 1929 to January 1930 is the wettest period on record in the UK.

It is a fact that parts of Devon and Cornwall have always been prone to serious flooding in autumn and winter. History is littered with examples as far back as the Tiverton floods in 1625 and major floods in 1877, some of the worst on record. The Black Thursday floods in October 1960 were the worst on record in Exeter and more recently we had floods in 2000 and 2009.

There is a lot of detail here, but to sum up:

•         In the UK as a whole, it was not particularly wet – 197 other months on record that have been wetter.

•         Worst affected was the South West, but no worse than many other years.

Why was it so wet?

There have been the usual attempts to blame the wet weather on climate change. But as the Met Office’s own meteorologist, Alex Deakin, explained after Storm Chandra, the root causes are much more mundane.

For the last few weeks, the polar vortex has brought extremely cold, polar air down across most of North America. This has pushed the jet stream a long way south of its usual track and at the same time powered it up. As a consequence, a succession of storms, which generally build to the north side of the jet stream, has brought a lot of wet weather to the south of the British Isles and Western Europe.

To make matters worse, a dome of persistent cold polar air has built up over Scandinavia, trapping the low pressure systems over Britain.

It is merely weather and has nothing to do with climate change at all. Watch Deakin’s excellent report below:

There’s plenty more rain to come in the next few days and probably next week too, but could there be a sign of a change on the horizon

There’s plenty more rain to come in the next few days and probably next week too, but could there be a sign of a change on the horizon

Bringing you this 10 day weather forecast is Alex Deakin 👇 pic.twitter.com/buVKd7Bgtw

— Met Office (@metoffice) January 28, 2026