UK metric debate in the House of LordsHi Pat, In reality, very little is lost due to non-metrication. Metrication was driven through Parliament by the CBI (Confederation of British Industry) in the 1970's and once they had obtained all the advantages that they needed, the momentum was lost. The only areas that were not metricated were those areas that affect the man in the street directly (no-one was prepared to put the money up front). The result is that we have a two-class system - the professionals use the metric system while the peasants use the Imperial system - a kind of intellectual apartheid.
As regards working elsewhere in Europe, the main problem is a lack of a second language, not a lack of understanding of the metric system Regards Martin ----- Original Message ----- From: Pat Naughtin To: U.S. Metric Association Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, January 15, 2007 11:23 AM Subject: [USMA:37742] UK metric debate in the House of Lords Dear All, You might be interested in this debate entitled 'EU: Non-metric Terms' held in the UK House of Lords on Monday 2006-11-27. http://www.theyworkforyou.com/lords/?id=2006-11-27a.541.0&s=speaker%3A13076 The debate seems to me to be liberally larded with misinformation and thoughtless nationalist posturing with the main arguments being based on some vague idea of tradition and a strong personal distaste for foreign ideas. My first reaction was to comment on all of the mistruths and errors contained within the thoughts of the various participants, but then I realised that they all had one thing in common — they seemed to have no idea how much their non-decision is costing their nation. All parties to this debate seem to be quite unaware of the costs of non-metrication in the UK. Here are some questions that I think might usefully be asked in the House of Lords in their next metric debate: ◊ How many UK businesses have lost European orders or contracts because they could not do the job in metric? ◊ How many UK businesses have not even been approached for quotations or estimates because European businesses automatically assume that businesses in the UK cannot do metric work? ◊ How much time and paper is wasted each day in UK offices as people try to layout page designs in inches and fractions of inches when they are using metric paper sizes? My estimate is about 10 % of office paper is wasted every day because of measurement issues. See the article, 'Page borders — Inches or millimetres' at http://www.metricationmatters.com/articles ◊ How many UK businesses have had to pay a premium for metric parts because they only bought enough for a specific job? ◊ How many have made costly mistakes in converting a metric job to old pre-metric measures? ◊ How many people have had to be terminated because they could not work in metric units? How much does it cost to find and employ their replacements? ◊ How much are the people of the UK prepared to pay to be different to everywhere else in Europe? ◊ How much does it cost to have someone buying one fastener when they need the other and having to make a second trip to the store to rectify the problem? ◊ How much does it cost to retrain UK school leavers in old measures when they have been taught the metric system at school every year since 1965? ◊ How many UK citizens cannot find employment in other countries because it is assumed that they won't be able to use metric units? ◊ How much extra does it cost UK industry for duplicating products in both metric and old pre-metric measures? ◊ How much extra does it cost UK industry for keeping both the metric and the old pre-metric inventories separate? ◊ How much extra does it cost UK industry to have stores that have to carry both metric and old pre-metric measures? ◊ How much extra production costs are involved with making products like fasteners in both metric and old pre-metric measures? ◊ How much has not-going metric really cost the UK? My estimate is about 10 % of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) or about £114 billion per year ($223 billion USD). See: the article 'costs of non-metrication' at http://www.metricationmatters.com/articles for details of this estimate in a USA context. ◊ How much is it going to cost the UK for not being metric between now and when the politicians finally accept that the complete adoption of the metric system in the UK is not only the most sensible decision that the House of Lords could support but also that it is inevitable anyway? Cheers, Pat Naughtin PO Box 305, Belmont, 3216 Geelong, Australia Phone 61 3 5241 2008 Pat Naughtin is the editor of the free online monthly newsletter, 'Metrication matters'. You can subscribe at http://www.metricationmatters.com/newsletter Pat is also recognised as a Lifetime Certified Advanced Metrication Specialist (LCAMS) with the United States Metric Association. He is also editor of the 'Numbers and measurement' section of the Australian Government Publishing Service 'Style manual – for writers, editors and printers'. He is a Member of the National Speakers Association of Australia and the International Federation for Professional Speakers. See: http://www.metricationmatters.com This email and its attachments are for the sole use of the addressee and may contain information that is confidential and/or legally privileged. This email and its attachments are subject to copyright and should not be partly or wholly reproduced without the consent of the copyright owner. Any unauthorised use of disclosure of this email or its attachments is prohibited. If you receive this email in error, please immediately delete it from your system and notify the sender by return email.
