Author: UK Metric Association

Campaigning for a single, rational system of measurement

Commonwealth Games to replace the 1500 m by a mile race

John Austin reports on the athletics programme for the 2026 Commonwealth Games, which will commence in Glasgow, Scotland on 27 July. National and International Athletics is almost entirely metric. The only imperial measurements in general use are “beneath the surface”: some shot weights are in whole numbers of pounds and hurdle and steeplechase heights are in imperial. Even the marathon is not an official distance in miles but is rather 42 195 m. So it may come as a surprise to most people to find that the 1500 m races have all been replaced by 1 mile [1].

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Cyprus shows how metrication should be done

John Frewen-Lord tells us about his experiences of living in Cyprus and how they completed metrication successfully, unlike the UK.

If any of you watch TV’s ‘A Place in the Sun’ then no doubt you will have seen Cyprus feature fairly regularly as one of the destinations that offer lots of sunshine combined with a Mediterranean lifestyle. My wife and I, in our twilight years, decided to take the plunge, and join roughly 150 000 other British expats in moving to the Greek side of the island, doing so last year (2025). We now have official Cyprus residency. [What follows relates only to the Greek part of Cyprus, with about 80% of the total population. The island was invaded by Turkey in 1974, and the Turkish side, about one-third of the island and not officially recognised by any country except Turkey, can be a bit problematical in terms of exiting back to the Greek side, and therefore remains more-or-less ‘off-limits’ as far as non-Cypriot expats are concerned.]

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Metric speed limits – 55 years of dilly-dallying

55 years ago today, the Government announced that,

“Speed limits on Britain’s roads are not to be metricated in 1973, as had been planned by the previous administration, and the Government has no alternative date in mind.”

 
In the 55 years since that announcement, successive governments have failed to set a new date for the changeover to metric speed limits. We reproduce here an extract from UKMA’s main website:

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UKMA’s response to the REUL Bill Select Committee

Yesterday, in the House of Lords, the Delegated Powers & Regulatory Reform Committee published its report on the Government’s Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill.

The Bill, which is due to have its second reading in the House of Lords on Monday 6 February, is designed to hand power from Parliament to Government Ministers, who will then decide the fate of up to 4000 laws.

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Government’s return to imperial set to make UK a laughing stock

Yesterday, the Government published its response to the so-called TIGRR report. It was reported in some newspapers as announcing the return of pounds and ounces.

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New role for Britain’s road signs

An analysis by the Government of UK economic prospects post-Covid has identified the importance for our economic recovery of services generally and tourism in particular. Meanwhile a separate study by tourism bodies has looked into attracting foreign tourists.

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How can people’s behaviour be changed?

One of our regular contributors, Phil Hall, looks at the success of the recently-introduced plastic bag charge in England, and asks if there are lessons for the completion of the UK’s stalled metric changeover.

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