SCOTTISH nationalists have reacted with fury after a Met Office study found the countrys weather was really quite unpleasant.

According to the research Scotland gets a lot of rain, often accompanied by wind, and that the amount of sunshine is statistically insignificant.

But SNP leader and first minister, Alex Salmond, dismissed the study as a pathetic attempt by unionist weathermen to talk Scotland down.

He added: The Met Office thinks Scotland is too wee and too wet to be a successful nation. An independent Scotland would enjoy the same climate as other small northern European countries, such as Norway and Iceland.

Salmond insisted that, based on perfectly reasonable assumptions Scotlands weather would improve by four per cent in the 10 years after independence, delivering an annual per capita increase of six and a half hours of sunshine.

The SNP leader also highlighted figures which showed that Dunbar, a small town on the east coast, was already one of the sunniest places in Britain. Bill McKay, from Dunbar, added: Its raining. Again.

A Met Office spokesman stressed it was pretty sure its figures were correct, adding: We use these little beakers to measure rainfall.

Meanwhile, in a separate study, the London School of Economics claimed an independent Scotland could make an enormous amount of money by exporting water.