Let me put it this way. I was training a pilot in a 4-jet recently when we heard a light ac pilot declare that he'd had to climb above cloud, but had no 'IMC qualification'. He needed to get down soon as the weather was closing in... I advised ATC to concentrate on giving him steady headings and not to combine changes in heading and height. He was talked down to VMC below, but couldn't see the aerodrome. Meanwhile I broke off my approach and re-positioned well away to the west until the pilot had the aerodrome in sight. He made a safe landing and while my trainee co-piglet flew the ILS approach I called the tower and got them to arrange for someone from the station flying club to go out and look after the pilot. After we landed I met him in Operations - I found that he was a CPL trainee on a modular course. He'd set off with a legal VFR forecast, but the weather ahead of him had deteriorated. He'd flown his 180 deg IMC avoidance turn - but found that the weather behind had also closed in. So he thought that the safer option was to climb up above cloud and to ask for help........ He told me that the first thing he was going to do when he got back was to enrol on an IMC rating course!
You can never trust the UK weather - so the IMC Rating is, in my opinion, a useful safety insurance. But it is NOT designed to give pilots sufficient training to equip them to fly for protracted periods in 'real' IMC!!