Germany is a country where there is an VMC bubble around each aircraft flying VFR till DFS issues a clearance.
This is a country specific weather phenomenon.
A term which I have often heard from German bizjet pilots is “IVFR”, and it is normally spoken with a smile
Also known as YFR. (Why-Eff-Ar)
And these are very careful ones, who don’t bust IFR minima. They seem to see it as the reality of life in Germany.
There’s a slight difference in risk between busting a minimum while descending towards ground close by or “barely touching” a fluff of cloud whilst climbing at 5000ft/min towards open sky 
The problem are our young and abitious co-pilots who will report you for either of these violations even if no one else cares much.
I would say that one of the advantages of living in the UK is that there is no such restriction :-)
But honestly, I don’t fully understand that
Even in the UK, on the first page of each AD entry in the AIP, there is a section “Flight rules”, and then either “VFR” or VFR/IFR". If you take any small UK airfield, say Headcorn, it says “VFR”. Is that not a restriction?
It just means that there are no IFR procedures. Ironically it also means that there are no IFR minima, so you could land there in 50m vis, Sky Obscured.
I could, if anyone wishes, go through the law on the subject; but it’s a bit tedious unless anyone really cares.
But what is really ironic is that, to hear Germans speak, you would think that the fields near all the UK airfields were littered with the hulks of burned out aircraft, whereas there are very few (Graham Hill being a very sad exception) while in Germany there seem to be quite a few.
I am not saying that CFIT does not happen in the UK, or to UK based aircraft. There have been far too many, recently in South Wales, near Blackpool, in Italy and in Nice, but these do not tend to be on final approach to VFR airfields in IMC.
I really do wonder whether it is the constraints of IFR which is killing people; the very kind of attitude which the German and some other authorities have. The “VMC Bubble” that Markus mentions is an example, and both the accidents in Nice and Northern Italy had elements of “you’re not IFR until we tell you you are IFR” in them.
Timothy,
you said you don’t have data that Germany has a higher VFR-in-IMC death rate than the UK or others. I would challenge that point of view until you can produce such data. There were 2 high profile cases recently but I also remember many others in other countries.
I would happily be shown to be wrong. These things seem to go in flurries.
Brits seem to be going through a spate of flying twins into mountains in VFR/IMC in the SE France/NW Italy area, Germans are flying cabin class aircraft into the ground at VFR airfields, Americans seem to be going hypoxic and crashing into the sea.
Maybe next year it will be all the other way round.
It just means that there are no IFR procedures.
Looking at the AIP, I just can’t see that. It actually says Type of traffic permitted. 
The AIP isn’t the law. If you want to quote the law you need the Air Navigation Order
Remember that, in UK law, everything that is not forbidden is permitted, so you are looking for reasons not to be allowed to land or take-off (anywhere) in IMC.
Could you share some more details in this particular regard? It might help us with our fight here in
Germany…
While the AIP is not law, it is certainly evidence. And to counter that only with “what’s not explictly forbidden is allowed” seems a little faint to me.
