I don't think we've reached a "tipping point" really. It's just weather, all-be-it a very, very extreme and OTT variation of it.

I'm also not really the weather is more volatile than it's ever been (but it has been pretty extreme since 2006) When you look at the huge variation that occured from around 1915 to 1920, that was a VERY volatile period.

Maybe the British isles is meant to see extreme weather. maybe thats the norm?

Did take me a while to get into that teatime quiz programme on ITV.

But being serious, No. We would have asked the same question in the winter of 1990 and the autumn of 2000. Likewise when we had massive heatwaves in the summer of '03 and '06 and the extended dry spell in the opening years of this decade - the very thing which is prompting the use of water meters in order to control our water supply - that, in itself was a talking point and I'm sure we'll go back to dealing with all that later on down the line.
   It's just our mid-latitude climate doing it's thang, whether we like it or not as we continue to take the rough with the smooth. Certainly making me admire and respect it all the more, never will I moan about our "boring climate" again.

However - and God forbid - if the next three or four winters does go along in the same style as the one we just had then perhaps I will be more convinced that something is up with our climate. There wouldn't be much left of the Cornish Coast if it does turn out to be the case!

Like other contributors, no is the answer. We have had two extremes so far this decade, this winter being consistently wet and stormy and ice and snow in November/December 2010. I think we will have a few more  extremes this decade at least. I would throw in a repeat of the 1995 summer at some stage. Hopefully we wont have a repeat of this winter for a longlong time. It caused awfull distruction and the after effects are still being felt

Anyone who moves country based on weather alone will fail as an expat and be back in the UK within 2 years I am certain of it.
The reasons for leaving the UK can be many and varied and usually a combination of many factors and the right mix for youwill mean success.

Originally Posted by: Andy Woodcock 

In my experience it's usually in order to be able to whine about the old country. I find that the people who whine the most are usually the ones who've been away the longest.
I still find it astonishing that an expat, who hasn't lived in the UK since the 1970's, can still pontifcate about this country. I've come across one or two of those.

Originally Posted by: SEMerc 

I don't think Syndey was pontificating at all just expressing an opinion which after all is what you do on a forum!

Originally Posted by: SydneyonTees 

I wasn't having a go at him. I was having a go at expats I know personally.

Well I'm biased in favour of North America, having lived a total of 12 years out there. Alaska is one state I'd love to visit.

I'm not surprised, for example, that reportedly only 12% of yanks have a passport, given that there are so many things to do and so many places to visit in North America there's no overwhelming need to go anywhere else.

It's a great read, you can get it on the link below, I think they ship to the UK. I got mine off a friend - exactly the same book.

http://www.amazon.com/Vitamin-Solar-Volume-Optimal-Health/dp/B002MY9A3U

Well if you'd have been around in 82 and that 48hour blizzard with that fine snow that came through the door jam and in peoples loft you'd have thought "Hello climate change flipping ice age time"

...and 76 summer begging & pleading for it to rain (Stupid pleaders, pleaded too much as from end of August76 it didn't stop raining for ages)

I think they even imported a Indian rain dancer top help with the drought (IM serves)

Yes, history and other cultures are so overrated.

I absolutely agree bar one word, I would say 'is probably becoming'. Infact I might add a few more 'probablys' here and there 

Lots of interesting replies to my post, but reviewing the original post, I think I worded it incorrectly!! 

What I was trying to say is 'IF' the weather/climate in the UK does change permanently for the worse with increasingly mild, wet and windy winters, then would it be enough to make you leave the country. If cold snowy winters became a thing of the past and winters like this one became the norm?

I have always liked you Vinnie

But only 11 months ago was the coldest March (and more either side) for decades, so what if that was the new normal.
It's an entirely hypothetical question.

No - weather records are there to be broken.

When we thought mild winters were here for ever - just look at December 2010.

The weather has become unbearable over the past 8 years, particularly since the start of 2011. In the space of 18 months we've had the worst summer on record and the worst winter on record. Two seasons so vile and depressing it's impossible to have any quality of life. Not when the weather is so wretchedly foul day in day out. No better than serving a prison sentence being cooped up indoors all the time

It is not a case of there being more extreme bad weather which would at least be interesting e.g. gales, blizzards, thunderstorms. There is actually far less. What we do get is just run-of-the-mill bog-standard bad weather that goes on for an eternity - a lack of changeability. We just get stuck in patterns which spew out the same crap day in day out

This is now the fourth write-off virtually snowless winter in 8 years. I thought the 90s were bad but only 91/92 was anywhere near as snowless as these four horrors. We've just had the fourth February in a row to be less snowy than February 1998. Combined with the worst run of summers in recorded history from 2007 to 2012 the weather has never felt so much like a perpetual autumn. Right now I am thinking that I hate living in this country and would rather live just about anywhere else in the western world.

Alan summed it up for me on page one of this thread and I'd agree with what most others have posted too.  I'm old enough to remember mild, wet winters as well as cold snowy ones, long hot summers and cool grey ones, so nothing surprises me and I'd never say never.  We always seem to come around to the question of climate change, when one season breaks records, but I don't believe climate change is anything new.

If we all fled the country because we get weather that we don't like, the UK would be pretty empty by now.  One of the things I like about living here is the changeable weather.  I think I'd get bored with weather that was predictable and I think it's because our weather is so unpredicatble that I'm happy and grateful for a snowy spell in winter and a hot sunny spell in summer.  Anyway, what would we talk about on here? 

Just when I thought your postings couldn't get any more gloomy, you come up with this....brilliant stuff!   Not sure if it was the intention but it certainly made me smile - I mean "Two seasons so vile and depressing it's impossible to have any quality of life" and

"Right now I am thinking that I hate living in this country and would rather live just about anywhere else in the western world".   Great lines!

In the midst of all the gloom, anyone would think Aberdeen hadn't seen a snowflake this side of the millenium, but the past few years Scotland has had some very noteworthy winter weather.  2009/10 was within a whisker of being the coldest winter in Scotland for over 100 years (all winter three months had CSTs below 1c for instance), and within a year of that,  December 2010  was truly remarkable north of the border..... not to mention the extremely snowy March 2006.

Cheer up, still time up there for a ground frost and a bit of sleet before April if you're lucky....

Totally agree! Most places in the world have prdictable boring climates eg a continental type climate.

Here in the uk every season is totally unpredictable and we experience all types of extremes from time to time.

All those banging on about climate change as if its something new,its been happening for the past 4.5 billion years and events like this wet winter have happened before,many times and will happen again,its just the British weather doing what it does,it does NOT mean our climate has changed or due to the myth of AGW.

Well whatever people feel is happening out there, one thing we do know is that the average global temperature is higher now than it was two decades ago or, to a much smaller extent, one decade ago.

That ties in directly with a higher average moisture content (per unit mass).

Systems which develop organised areas of high moisture then amplify this effect;

Imagine filling a tub with water from 10 buckets, all 10 litres capacity, then emptying the tub and filling it with water from 10 buckets, all 10.1 litres capacity. The net gain is a whole extra litre.

It then follows that the potential limit for the amount of rain falling in a given period across some part of the world is higher now than it was 10 or to a larger extent 20 years ago.

A similar argument can work for heatwaves, though I feel it gets a lot more complicated with that one so I tend to leave it alone at the moment.

Richard possibly doesn't recall any of those memorable events!