Posts: 1461
From: West Sussex, UK.
Registered: Jun 2003
posted May 29, 2014 05:25 PM
Sorry to disappoint, but it's another Euromyth, probably invented by the Daily Express or the Daily (hate) Mail.
quote: The EU has criminalised the use of imperial units in Britain.
Trading with non-legal units has always been an offence through the centuries. It has been a criminal offence to use the peck and bushel since 1968. Other units whose use has been a criminal offence for some years include the stone and hundredweight. Penalties are set by national governments.
On the wider issue of denying freedom of choice, weights and measures legislation is there to protect the public, by ensuring that the standards used for measuring equipment are maintained, and that traders are providing honest and open information to the public. Trading Standards Officers protect the public against unscrupulous traders. To permit traders and public to pick and choose which units they want to use would lead to anarchy, and the sort of confusion that anti-metric supporters claim to be against. There was no outcry by such people when a UK publican was fined by Trading Standards for selling beer in metric measures! Nor were there any complaints when it became illegal to sell by the stone several years ago.
Mike
-------------------- Auntie Em must have stopped wondering where I am by now...
Posts: 1373
From: Penistone Sheffield UK
Registered: Oct 2012
posted May 30, 2014 04:52 AM
"Other units whose use has been a criminal offence for some years include the stone and hundredweight. Penalties are set by national governments."
I wonder if that's why why I go to the hospital and they weighed me in kilos and I ask for it in English, they then proceed to stick a needle in me. OUCH.
-------------------- I love the smell of film in the morning.
Posts: 591
From: Neath, South Wales, UK
Registered: Jun 2003
posted May 30, 2014 06:45 AM
I remember that joke from when the UK introduced the metric system to replace imperial weights:
Female pensioner: " I'd like two pounds of potatoes please" Grocer: "Sorry, my lovely, it's kilos now" Pensioner: Oh, I'll have two pounds of kilos please"
-------------------- I'm gonna live forever or die trying