It says so here
In 1996 the Met Office became a Trading Fund within the Ministry of Defence. As a Trading Fund we are required to operate on a commercial basis and meet agreed performance targets as set by our Ministerial Owner.
It also says
The Under Secretary of State for Defence and the Minister for Veterans, currently Kevan Jones, is the individual charged with directing and overseeing the Met Office on behalf of the Secretary of State for Defence.
The ultimate responsibility and accountability lies with the Secretary of State for Defence, currently the Right Honourable Bob Ainsworth MP.
There has to be a list somewhere that shows fairness, and will show how much the Met Office 'earns' and how much has been cut from its' budget.
After all, the MoD is cutting military funding, including that of the youth branches of the Army (ACF and UOTC) and the TA (whose soldiers have to go into battle).
3 comments:
And who did they belong to before 1996? The secret services perhaps: in the mid 80s I asked the Met Office or whatever it was then called for information on weather conditions in a certain location at a certain date and they refused to provide it. The location was a high street just north of London; the date was significant only because the person on behalf of whom I was doing this research had had an accident at that location and the weather had become an issue. The Met Office or whatever they then called themselves refused to assist and when asked why the information was not available they quoted the Official Secrets Act.
I thought the Met Office was set up to provide a service to seafarers, both merchant and military, and collected data from ships to help with forecasting.
There's more here, no dates though http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/weatherguide/affects.html
"The Met Office is part of the MoD for both historical and supply reasons. Originally a small department within the Board of Trade, the Met Office was taken under the wing of the Air Ministry just after the First World War, later moving into the MoD. Additionally, by owning the Met Office, in times of a national crisis the MoD can guarantee access to the forecasting service."
Perhaps their piss-poor forecasting is all a ploy to confound the Enemy!
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