Category: Media

Imaginative media spin on a non-event?

Supporters of consumer protection have been alarmed at reports suggesting that the Government is to tell local councils not to enforce aspects of weights and measures law.  Can this really be true?

Various newspapers and broadcasters have reported alleged comments by Secretary of State John Denham that he intends to “introduce new guidelines within months that would prevent local authorities from taking traders to court” (for offences connected with using illegal scales, and weighing and pricing in illegal measures). See for example BBC report http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7677438.stm.

In fact this report makes little sense. Mr Denham cannot change a law that has been passed by the UK Parliament, nor can he require Trading Standards Authorities (TSAs) not to enforce it. Indeed the existing guidance to TSAs, which is issued by the Local Authorities Co-ordinators of Regulatory Services (LACORS) in consultation with the Mr Denham’s Department (which can be downloaded from http://www.lacors.gov.uk/lacors/ContentDetails.aspx?id=17089), already recommends that enforcement action should be “proportionate”. See for example, paragraph 3.1:

“3.1 Local Authorities must continue to demonstrate their commitment to consistent, proportionate action to ensure that those remaining traders who continue to trade in imperial units through ignorance of the law or misleading media coverage, do convert to selling in metric units, and to ensure that cohesive action is taken over any remaining high profile traders who refuse as a point of principle to comply.”

The debate, of course, is about what constitutes “proportionate” action, and the LACORS guidance makes it clear that prosecution should be a seldom used last resort. It is difficult to see how any new advice (whether from LACORS or the Government itself) could go any further in discouraging prosecution without actually telling them not to enforce the law.

With regard to the legality of non-enforcement, the LACORS guidance continues:

“3.6 Authorities are advised to have regard to the provisions of Counsel’s Opinion in relation to the duty to enforce. The relevant points provide that Local Authorities may not decline to perform their statutory duties under the Act, thus, whilst they enjoy discretion whether or not to prosecute in an individual case, that discretion may not be used to justify a general policy of non-prosecution and must be exercised reasonably. The Code for Crown Prosecutors advises that prosecutors must not be affected by improper or undue pressure from any source and Counsel advises that the exercise of the discretion not to prosecute, principally in order to avoid potential political difficulties, might well amount to “improper” or “undue” pressure.”

So local Councils may not have a policy of non-enforcement, and the Secretary of State cannot legally encourage Councils not to enforce the law.

Perhaps the most charitable interpretation is that Mr Denham was caught off guard and made some ill thought-out, populist remarks, leaving his civil servants to try to limit the damage.

UKMA will be writing to Mr Denham seeking clarification of his alleged comments and inviting him to confirm that he does not condone law-breaking or failure to enforce the law.

Acre not to be abolished – unfortunately

The media just can’t get it right. Nor can they miss any opportunity, however unfounded, to knock both the metric system and the European Union. The latest non-story is to be found in the Daily Telegraph and Daily Mail of 21 July.

With a headline “EU abolishes British acre” the Telegraph declares that “The acre, one of Britain’s historic imperial measurements, is to be banned from use under a new European directive.” Similarly, the Daily Mail’s headline announced: “Selling land by the acre to be banned under new EU ruling.” See these links:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1036895/Selling-land-acre-banned-new-EU-ruling.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2310257/European-Union-abolishes-the-British-acre.html

Both papers then go on to print verbatim the misinformed comments of a Conservative spokesman – from which it is obvious that the story emanates from a Conservative Party press release.

In fact the acre is not to be abolished. All that has happened is that, since the UK’s Land Registries have for many years used hectares rather than acres for land registration, it has been agreed that the exemption for acres for this purpose (and this purpose only) is redundant. So the decision is a tidying up measure that makes no practical difference to this or any other uses of the acre.

In any case, land is not bought and sold by unit of area (that is, priced per acre or hectare). Each site is unique and is sold as a single lot. You can’t stroll into the estate agent and order “10 acres/hectares of land, please”. Where acres and hectares are used, they are simply descriptions of the size of a site.

However, when it comes to paying of EU subsidies under the Common Agricultural Policy, hectares are of course mandatory. This is because a consistent means of calculating subsidies is necessary, and since every other country uses hectares, it is only sensible that the UK should fall into line.

UKMA believes that it would be better if acres WERE abolished for all remaining legal, trade and official purposes. Once it is understood that a hectare is equivalent to a square 100 m by 100 m, it is very easy to work with. (The Mail and Telegraph articles illustrate the dysfunctional nature of acres by including the helpful information that an acre is 4840 square yards!) It is also highly inconvenient to have to work in hectares for some purposes and acres for others, with all the problems of conversion errors and incomprehension that result.

So the Mail and the Telegraph got it wrong. The EU has not abolished the acre. If only the UK Government would.

No Olympic games without measurement

Accurate and consistent measurement is fundamental to modern life, and in few branches of human activity is it more important than in sport – including, of course, the Olympic Games. This is the message given by Andrew Wallard, the President of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) to mark World Metrology Day (article suggested by Martin Vlietstra).

In his message Professor Wallard argues that “Our motto for 2008, “No Games without Measurement,” may be stating the obvious but we all know that measurement is important to nearly all aspects of society. So let us use [World Measurement Day] to press our message home to a particular group of people with whom we may normally have little contact, in the hope that they will appreciate what we do for them! Let us all hope they may go on to appreciate the importance of good measurement in its broadest contexts in our world.” If only.

Unfortunately, many British people (including many journalists) are non-numerate when it comes to measurement. Probably the most important reason for this is the fact that we try to muddle through with two incompatible systems of measurement, often making inaccurate conversions and failing to grasp the meaning of reported dimensions. Thus, journalists measure height in “double decker buses”, length in “football pitches”, and use “the size of Wales” as a unit of area. Meanwhile the NHS has invented a new unit of measurement for alcohol imaginatively called … the “unit”!

This reluctance to use the obvious measurement units (in these examples, metres, square kilometres and centilitres) is partly the result of the Government’s policy of teaching metric units in school maths and science lessons while maintaining imperial units for much of everyday life outside the school gate. In practice, in order to function effectively in modern Britain, people need to understand both metric and imperial units – yet many do not have a secure grasp of either. Hence the resort to physical comparisons and disguising metric units with new names.
Professor Wallard’s message can be read in full on the BIPM website at this link.

Also of interest on the BIPM website are the links to the following factsheets issued on World Metrology Day:

Distance
Height
Mass
Pressure
Speed
Substance
Time
Traceability

(NB: Copyright on these factsheets rests with BIPM and its partners)
Notes:

  1. World Metrology Day was 20 May – the anniversary of the signing of the Metre Convention in 1875, which the UK signed up to (late, of course) in 1884. The official text of the Convention is in French, but an English translation can be read on the US Metric Association website at this link.
  2. Andrew Wallard, Director of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) studied Natural Philosophy (Physics) at St Andrews University where he was awarded his PhD. He subsequently worked at the National Physical Laboratory and at Whitehall in the Department for Trade and Industry before taking up the deputy directorship of the BIPM under fellow-Briton, Prof Quinn. After Prof. Quinn retired, Wallard was appointed director of the BIPM.

The London Marathon

This weekend thousands of runners will test themselves to the full in the annual Flora London Marathon. At 42.195 km, it is a race of endurance. But why 42.195 km? That is tied up in the history of the 1908 London Olympic Games. But why does the United Kingdom press call it a 26 mile 385 yard race and does it matter? For the record, two measurements differ by 1 cm. (Article contributed by Martin Vlietstra)

Continue reading “The London Marathon”

Delia goes metric

Delia Smith’s new book, “How to cheat at cooking”, was published on 15 February, and it is ALL METRIC! Not an ounce, pint, cup or Fahrenheit is to be found between the covers of this latest volume, targeted as it is at busy people who like cooking but don’t have time for elaborate preparation.

It is 5 years since the doyenne of tv cooks last published, and in the intervening period, Delia (or more probably her publisher) appears to have accepted that imperial conversions of every metric ingredient are no longer necessary or desirable. The only arguably non-metric measures given are teaspoons and tablespoons, but as these are now standardised at 5 ml and 15 ml respectively, this is perhaps forgivable. So, well done, Delia! (Examples of her recipes can be seen at this link).

Whether to give recipes in dual metric/imperial units (and if so, which should be primary) has been a difficult issue for publishers for many years. The argument used to be that older cooks would not understand grams and millilitres (obviously, anybody over 50 is unable to learn anything new) and in any case their kitchen scales would be imperial. Then it was argued that even younger people, despite doing “home economics” exclusively in metric at school, really prefer to use the same traditional units as their parents and grandparents. Neither argument proved to be valid – but there was a potentially more weighty argument: the American market.

As the British and the Americans (not to mention Australians, Irish and others) share a common language, it is convenient for publishers if they can produce a single edition of a book for sale in all English-speaking markets. Thus even though publishers find it economic to produce cookery books in minority languages like Danish or Slovak (population ca. 5 million in each case), they have used this argument to resist producing metric-only editions for the British/Australian market and US customary editions for the American market. (This is rather like the threadbare arguments used in the recent controversy about separate metric and US customary packaging for the EU and USA markets).

In reality the argument was always somewhat shaky. Leaving aside the separate culinary tastes and traditions of the national populations, European recipes tend to measure liquid ingredients by volume (in ml) but dry ingredients by weight (in grams) whereas American recipes tend to measure both liquid and dry ingredients by volume (hence “cups” of flour). The American pint (473 ml) is of course smaller than the imperial pint (568 ml).
Problems also arise over how to convert. If the starting point is a traditional imperial recipe, do you convert 1 lb to 450 g or round it up to 500 g? Similarly, should a pint be converted to 570 ml, or rounded up to 600 ml – or down to 500 ml? Note that too much rounding can throw out the relative proportions of ingredients – e.g. if you round dry ingredients up and liquid ingredients down, your cake may dry out and burn.

Undoubtedly, the best answer is to forget about imperial/US customary units, re-measure your recipe in the correct proportions and publish it exclusively in metric units. This appears to be what Delia has done. Congratulations!

Many celebrity cooks, women’s magazines and cookery sections of newspapers have actually preceded Delia in going metric-only. Let us hope that, with Delia’s splendid example in mind, the remaining imperial holdouts will also soon fall into line.

Metres and yards – now interchangeable?

A reader of Metric Views has drawn our attention to a paragraph in the DfT Traffic Signs Manual that allows distances shown as ‘yards’ on some traffic signs to be measured in metres. We wonder if this idea on interchangeability has spread beyond the DfT.

Continue reading “Metres and yards – now interchangeable?”

Imperial scales may give short measure says metric group

The following news release was issued by UKMA at 02:00 on 18 January:

news release … news release … news release … news release … news release …

For immediate release

“Imperial scales may give short measure” says metric group

The general public would be well advised to avoid buying from traders who use illegal scales that only weigh in pounds and ounces – so says the UK Metric Association (UKMA). Imperial-only scales have not been checked by Trading Standards Officers for over eight years, and it is quite possible that they are no longer accurate. There is therefore a significant chance that when you buy from shop or market stall that uses illegal scales you will get less than you are paying for.

Responding to reports that a market stall-holder in Hackney is being prosecuted on Friday, 18 January for Weights and Measures offences, UKMA Chairman, Robin Paice, said; “Obviously, I can’t comment on this particular case as we don’t know the full facts. However, the publicity surrounding the case suggests that, like the so-called ‘metric martyrs’ in Sunderland and elsewhere, this is really a political stunt. People are entitled to campaign to change the law, but they are not entitled to break laws just because they disagree with them. They don’t deserve any sympathy.”

Background

Since 2000, UK law has required that all shops and markets in the UK must weigh and measure at the point of sale (checkout) in grams and kilograms. Traders’ scales are periodically tested by Trading Standards Officers (TSOs) to ensure they are accurate. However, traders can still give an equivalent price in pounds and ounces if they wish. Customers can also order in pounds and ounces if they wish, and the shopkeeper or trader simply has to weigh out an equivalent amount in grams and kilograms.

Originally, it was intended that the option to show equivalent imperial prices would be phased out after 2009, but the European Commission has now proposed that this option should be retained indefinitely. However, increasingly, supermarkets are dropping the imperial equivalents, and customers are ordering at the deli counter in grams rather than obsolete ounces.

Unfortunately, egged on by populist, Eurosceptic politicians, some traders decided in 2000 to try to defy the law and continue weighing in pounds and ounces. The so-called “metric martyrs” (more accurately, they were “imperial luddites”) were found guilty of various offences under the Weights and Measures Act and fined. All their appeals to the UK courts and even the European Court of Human Rights were rejected in 2001/2.

The current issue in Hackney appears to be an attempt to re-run the same political stunt. It is unlikely to work, as it is now obvious that the law is home-grown UK law and not dictated by Brussels. People are getting rather bored by the antics of fringe politicians seeking bogus martyrdom.

UKMA Chairman, Robin Paice added:
“The purpose of the UK law is to ensure that consumers can compare goods in the supermarket and the street market on the same basis, using the same measurement units. How can you compare tomatoes at £2.09 per kilogram in the supermarket with tomatoes at 99p per pound in the market – unless you know the conversion factors and have a pocket calculator with you? It is fundamental to consumer protection that every body uses the same measurement units.

My advice to shoppers is this:

  • Avoid traders who use illegal imperial scales. You don’t know whether you are getting short measure.
  • Don’t waste your sympathy on traders who deliberately broke the law in order to seek bogus martyrdom. The vast majority of traders operate legally and cope perfectly well with metric measures.

Every country needs a single system of weights and measures that everybody understands and uses for all purposes. Nobody needs two systems.”

Notes for editors

(a) The UK Metric Association (UKMA) is an independent, non-party political, single issue organisation which advocates the full adoption of the international metric system (“Système International” – SI) for all official, trade, legal, contractual and other purposes in the United Kingdom as soon as practicable. UKMA is financed entirely by membership subscriptions and personal donations.

(b)Further extensive background information can be found generally on UKMA’s website at www.ukma.org.uk.

(c) The following are available for interviews:

Robin Paice (Chairman of UKMA) on 023 9275 5268 or for radio/TV interviews in Portsmouth or Southampton

Derek Pollard (Secretary) on 020 8374 6997 for radio/TV interviews in London

Guyana shows the way

Metric Views has come across an interesting letter in a newspaper published in Georgetown, Guyana.
Extracts are reprinted below (acknowledgements to Stabroek News http://www.stabroeknews.com/index.pl/article_letters?id=56535420). The UK authorities could learn from the determined approach to metric conversion adopted by this former British colony.

The entire world is moving in the metric direction, Guyana needs to catch up
Thursday, December 20th 2007

“Dear Editor,

I take this opportunity to thank the many writers of letters in the letter columns of the three daily newspapers for their interest in the subject of metrication and the lively debate on the question of accuracy, margin of error etc.
………….

Let me take this opportunity also to enlighten the various writers that since the re-launching of the National Metrication programme by the GNBS in 1996, the approach taken was one of education and sensitization and the following strategies have been used to get the metric message across to the Guyanese consumer:

* Think Metric Training programmes and practical exercises for all sectors including the education sector.

* The conduct of surveillance exercises countrywide at municipal markets, shops, supermarkets etc. where proprietors are shown how to price and label in metric.

* One to one education visits conducted at all commercial entities.

* Sector visits at Government Ministries, public and private sector organizations including Non-Governmental Organizations to determine training needs and carry out training when necessary.

* Distribution of ‘fact sheets, brochures, conversion tables etc.

* Live television programmes done in workshop style.

* Issuing letters of misuse to defaulters.

* Providing answers to consumers who request information via telephone.

* Setting up of a National Metrication Committee to assist the national metrication drive.

* Publication of articles and advertisements in the newspapers and other periodicals.

* Scheduled verification and calibration of all devices in metric units.

In conclusion, the GNBS wishes to inform consumers that 98% of the world’s trade is conducted in metric units and even the United States which is taking steps to change over, though it uses the imperial system of domestic commerce, uses the metric system for all its scientific work and for international trade.

The entire world is moving in the metric direction, so Guyana needs to move ahead and stop delaying the change over of the process by hanging on to the imperial system.

Yours faithfully,

Evadnie Benfield

Head, Information Services

For Executive Director

Guyana National Bureau of Standards”

Doesn’t it sound familiar?