I'm curious: if anthropogenic climate change is a hoax or a scam, what would the motivation be?
I think people on both sides of this argument make the mistake of expecting clear, continuous trends with no noise and no variation - which seriously fails to understand the level of unpredictability already in the system. The key point is that a single year tells you precisely nothing - you need to look at averages across 10 years or more.
Whether any of the 'abnormal' weather events of the last few years are human driven or not, there is one underlying fact that is inescapable: the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased. We also have very good reason to believe that this CAN lead to more heat being trapped in the atmosphere. It is, in fact, almost irrelevant whether or not it actually is: we are in a situation where we know there to be risk associated with our behaviour. We also know what decisions to take to reduce that risk. For that simple fact, it is worth thinking very hard about actually doing things that reduce that risk - many of which make long term sense anyway. For instance: we know that fossil fuels are running out and have significant negative qualities that have nothing to do with climate (sulphur dioxide, for instance), so it makes sense to look for alternatives anyway. We also know that a lot of the fossil fuels we rely on are held by people who, it turns out, are rather difficult to deal with (oil in the middle East; gas by that nice Mr. Putin), so again, it makes sense to figure out ways to avoid having to be reliant on them.
I used to be convinced that anthropogenic climate change WAS definitely happening. I am much less sure now, but I am still very much convinced that there are extremely compelling reasons to behave AS IF it was. The long term costs of acting as it was real, and being wrong are probably higher than the long term costs of acting as if it was not and being wrong.
In many ways climate change deniers are like people who refuse to use a seat belt: sure, you may be a terribly good driver, and unlikely to crash, but there is still a very real probability that you will, and wearing that seat belt may make all the difference.
I will add that this latest headline is not news at all - it's just the media reccycling something that's been around for quite some time. The majority of projections for the UK have been predicting an increase in uncertainty and extreme events for some time, with a tendency to project wetter conditions overall.