The following article appeared in last Sunday's Mail on Sunday. as most people here probably know, this is not exactly a left-wing or even centrist paper, especially when it comes to things like the EU. The author is a former editor of the paper, renowned for spirited attacks on anything he perceives as left-wing; all of which makes the following all the sweeter. He kindly e-mailed me this copy, as it's not available on-line. He also said that more would follow this Sunday. Enjoy! > >Stewart Steven Political Column 21/1/2001 > > >I feel sorry for Mr Steve Thoburn, the Green Grocer and Market Trader from >Sunderland who is paraded before the world as a �Metric Martyr². You will >know the case because this great newspaper is foremost among those who have >pleaded Mr Thoburn¹s cause. Poor old Steve - a puppet in a wider game in >which others are pulling the strings. > > His legal bills are being paid by the UK Independence Party which wants >this country out of Europe, the Bruges Group which pretends it¹s not quite >so extreme but in truth is and an organisation called the British Weights >and Measures Association which has close links with the UKIP. > > People say that the local authority was a bit heavy handed in prosecuting >him. Forget it. Steve¹s backers were gagging for it - forcing the issue >until Sunderland Council had no alternative but to act. How do I know that >? Because in 1995 (when the Tories were in office) the BWMA told us so. >In a Press Release they have been careful not to remind newspapers about >recently they announced a campaign of civil disobedience because ³this >unpopular law will be only be repealed when the jails start to fill with >Britons². I hope Mr William ³Law and Order² Hague didn¹t know that when >he sent his emissary to meet Mr Thoburn and offer his support. > > Everyone involved in Mr Thoburn¹s high profile campaign, even his >barrister Mr Michael Shrimpton, a leading member of the Bruges Group a fact >of which I hope he told the Court, is involved in one or other of the >organisations I have mentioned. Everything about Mr Thoburn¹s case is >politically motivated. >Well, you may say, so what. Mr Thoburn is a victim of a piece of >anti-democratic legislation which is inspired by Brussels. Let¹s take a >look > >Almost everything we buy is sold by weight, volume or length. Since the >earliest times , as the most basic piece of consumer protection, these >matters have been closely regulated. Weights and Measures are mentioned in >the Magna Carta. In his first message to Congress, George Washington drew >attention to the need for ³uniformity in currency and weights and >measures². This is not a new Blairite obsession. > > The decision to introduce metrication into Britain, was made by Parliament >long before we joined Europe, under the Weights and Measures Act of 1963 >(Prime Minister Sir Alec Douglas Home). In 1968 a Metrication Board was set >up by two of Labour¹s foremost Anti-European Ministers. Tony Benn and >Douglas Jay. > >We can go back still further. In 1875 (Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli) >Britain signed up to an International agreement, called the Systeme >International d¹Unites. The object of the agreement was to establish a >universal system of weights and measures based upon the Metric system. >That work and the organisation which it spawned is still very much alive >today. Its standards of measurements - known as SIs - are pretty well >universally accepted. The whole world eventually will be a metric world. > > >A lot of people question why we need all this uniformity? If all we ever did >was to go shopping to the local market, we wouldn¹t. But there¹s more to >life than that. As Ian Lang the then Tory President of the Board of Trade >put it in 1995 ³The United Kingdom adopted a metrication programme following >representations in the 1960s from British industry which was concerned that >it would be put at a disadvantage internationally ...the metric system is >now used almost universally around the globe². > >Oddly enough it is in Sport where you will find the point perfectly >illustrated. When I was at school, I ran the 100 yards and the quarter of >a mile, Today that would be 100 metre and 400 metres. Why did our >governing bodies of sport capitulate? Not because they were a bunch of >cringing, toadying, namby pamby crypto-federalists, because not to have done >so would have been a piece of self-defeating nonsense which would have led >to national humiliation and shame. How could our athletes have ever >competed successful on the world stage running one distance when all their >preparation is this country was at another ? What is true of Sport is true >of trade and industry a thousand times over. > > >Probably our friend Steve isn¹t aware of all of this but you can be sure >that his backers are. They hate the whole idea of the EU and bend and >twist respectable; argument to convert more and more of us to their cause. >They are not interested in truth, only in politics;. They distort >facts, run dishonest and bogus campaigns and most disgracefully ,risk the >imprisonment of a decent if deluded man . > >They know perfectly well that metrication has little or nothing to do with >Brussels. If the EU had never been invented, we would still be where we are >today . > > For us the generation caught in between it is difficult and yes, >sometimes, infuriating. I doubt if I will ever have a fixed image in my >mind of what constitutes a hectare. I know what mile is. I have very little >sense of what is a kilometre . I ask for a pound of sausages at my >butchers. He knows what I mean and weights them out in kilograms. > >I am afraid ,however personally inconvenient, it has to be like that. We >can¹t run two systems in parallel for long without making our weights and >measures utterly incompresnisble. No, I,m afraid change was always >inevitable. We¹re unlucky because we¹re the folk that got the short >straw. Anyone under thirty has no problems at all. > > Should Steve go to prison though ? Of course not and he doesn¹t need to. >He only risks imprisonment not because of the offences but because he will >have refused to pay a fine. Actually, contrary to what you may have read, >the law itself is not all that onerous. If Steve wants to sell his bananas >using imperial weights he is perfectly at liberty to do so. All the >regulations (agreed by the Euro sceptic Mr Francis Maude at the EC council >of Ministers in 1989) insists upon is that Mr Thoburn and anyone else who >sells loose goods is that the weight is displayed in metric as well as >imperial and that the scale on which they have been weighed is a metric >scale. You may find that a bit pettifogging but throughout the history of >this and every other country for very good reasons weights have been most >carefully regulated. > > Now you can be sure that if he is found guilty and fined, Steve¹s new >friends will be urging him not to pay. They want a Metric Martyr and as far >as they are concerned Steve has got the job. > >Steve, don¹t listen! Just remember who will be doing the porridge. It >will be you. And who will be sipping the cream? It will be them. > >Don¹t let them do it you you Steve, you¹re worth ten of anyone of them. > >***************** > >Other countries around the world struggle with the need to go metric but all >are trying. Look at poor old China whose system makes our imperial measures >seem to be utterly logical. > >They have the Ch¹ih which varies throughout the country from 11 to 15.8 >inches; the Ching which is 121 square feet and , proving the importance of >a mere apostrophe, the Ch¹ing which is 72,600 square feet; the Hu which is >51.77 litres; the Kung which is 78.96 inches; the Liang which is just over >one ounce; the Mou which is, depending upon where you live, 806.65 or 920 >square yards. > >They¹re all either out or being phased out and as far as I know not a >metric martyr in sight. Or is there something their tightly controlled Press >isn¹t telling us ? -- Chris KEENAN UK Metrication: http://www.metric.org.uk/ UK Correspondent, US Metric Association
