Isn't that why the PIFR was introduced so that PPL's could get an instrument rating that wasn't going to be expensive or currency dependent?
When I was an instructor and I got to this part of the syllabus the first thing I did was make the student close his/her eyes and fly the plane. When it invariably started to wind itself up into a spiral dive I would ask them to open their eyes. The resultant gasp and "jump" as they saw the picture out the window was hopefully enough to make them realise that the 3 hours they were about to do would not be enough to keep them alive if they did get into cloud.