Well given the facts i would like to add to my earlier comments and the discussion.
Rules are rules and perhaps sometimes rules can be bent but amoung all the myths in aviation the dangers of flying into imc without the training or the kit is not one of them. Now a current and capable instrument pilot in a suitable aircraft of any type (whether or not it is approved for instrument flight) will get on just fine and i know of a few pilots who will do just that. What they do is illegal but at least they are no more likely to kill themselves or anyone else.
What we dont know is if this pilot intended any such thing.
It is wrong to assume that all pilots operate to the same minima. When we start flying a base of 2000 feet seems low. With time experience and training vfr at 500 might work (as one of the earlier posters mentioned). I have done many a local jaunt with a 600 foot cloudbase quite happily. Ok i am not rcommending doing so unless you are certain you have the skills but the supposition that scud running is lethal is one of the myths.
For all of these reasons i feel rightly a controller should be congratulated for passing on weather information and on occasions using some of the other "tricks" available to him to test the pilots resolve to do something illegal or dangerous but that is as far as it should go.
I have heard on many occasions contollers asking pilots whether they can accept an ifr clearance. The pilots is now on the spot. While as we know in the uk at the moment he can continue on an ifr clearance in vmc without an ir not many know that! Moreover most pilots would get to grips with the reason for the controller asking being because he expects the flight to enter imc. So the pilot is now vocalising that he is prepared to do something illegal. Not many are prepared to go that far.
Of course as would seem to be the case here the pilot may simply state he will continue vfr and if he thinks he can he is entitled to do so as he will be outside cas. Equally in cas the contoller can refuse the clearance if he cant accept ifr albeit as i indicated ealier he can still "cheat" and claim he has maintained vmc although that may be very unlikely!