Many Brexit supporters had recently become a little impatient. They wanted to know from Boris Johnson when the benefits of leaving the EU will finally be felt in everyday life. After all, the Prime Minister had promised nothing less than the return of freedoms that were believed to be lost. Now the wait is over: the British government has published a list of projects, which causes cheers in the Brexiteers camp.
The most applause went to the plan to abolish EU rules on units of measure. In future, British shops will again be allowed to only display goods in pounds and ounces. This was not allowed under EU rules; the weight had to be specified in grams or kilograms at the same time. This “metric martyrdom” had long been repugnant to the Brexiteers. With the return to the imperial system, which is reminiscent of the heyday of the British Empire, the government wants to separate itself from the continent once more.
Grocer Steven Thoburn (right) was fined in 2001 for refusing to give the weight of goods in kilograms.
(Photo: dpa)
A look at Friday’s conservative newspapers shows how great this need is. Don’t just remember Times and Daily Telegraph The story of the greengrocer Steven Thoburn, who was fined in 2001 for failing to declare 34p worth of bananas in kilograms. At the time, the judge formulated a sentence that reads like a warning from a Brexiteer: “As long as this country remains a member of the European Union, the laws of this country are subject to the doctrine of Community law.”
In the Brexit camp, the Thoburn case is seen as a kind of starting signal for the Leave campaign. Boris Johnson was also wonderfully upset about the verdict. As editor-in-chief of the conservative magazine Spectator he wrote at the time: “Why are we forcing the British to use Napoleon’s measurements when the imperial system in America, the world’s most successful economy, survives and thrives?”
It can be confusing: You fill up a liter of gasoline, but you don’t buy a liter of milk, but two pints
So it will soon be the case again in the United Kingdom: ounces instead of grams. A reader of the Times probably not wrongly pointed out that the imperial system “has not been known to anyone who has left school since the 1970s”. The ounce as a unit of measurement, in particular, is hardly ever encountered in everyday life.
According to the government, the planned change in the law should take place “in due course”. But consumer advocates are already warning of a mess with the units of measurement. On the other hand, people in Great Britain are used to a certain amount of back and forth. So you fill up about a liter of gasoline, but don’t buy a liter of milk, but two pints, which in turn corresponds to 1.14 liters.
You always order a pint in a pub
Many British peculiarities also survived the UK’s EU membership. Great Britain, for example, stuck to the fact that distances on roads were given in miles and yards. And in the corona pandemic, mind you after Brexit, nobody came up with the idea of replacing the two-meter distance rule with a foot-inch variant, although it is quite common to indicate your own height in these units of measurement .
If there is such a thing as an almost eternal constant, it is probably the pint you order in the pub. This unit of measurement survived EU membership, unlike the so-called crown stamp on beer glasses. For centuries, this was considered to be proof of the correct calibration of the vessels, but was superseded by the EU-wide CE mark in 2007. Now the royal crown can return to the beer glasses.
Of the Daily Telegraph called the Crown Stamp a “cornerstone of British life” on Friday. She survived two world wars and the crumbling of the Empire, but she had no chance against Brussels. After all, this disgrace should soon be overcome.