Brexit discussion thread XIV (Please read OP before posting)

kowloon

Spelling is one thing, it's when Irish people start saying "faucet" that we need to burn the place down and start again.

This is one of the most pathetic things I've ever seen put into words. The ramblings of a red-pilled incel would make more sense than proposing the removal of metric in 2021.

They are so paranoid and full of hate, they just want to get rid of anything remotely related to the EU. If the scientific community renamed the metre to "her majesty's yard", they'd be more than happy to keep metric.

lawred2

[Deleted User] wrote: »

This is one of the most pathetic things I've ever seen put into words. The ramblings of a red-pilled incel would make more sense than proposing the removal of metric in 2021.

They are so paranoid and full of hate, they just want to get rid of anything remotely related to the EU. If the scientific community renamed the metre to "her majesty's yard", they'd be more than happy to keep metric.

It shouldn't be an offence though should it!? But the fact that it's an offence is a UK matter. There's no such offence in Ireland that compels the use of metric over Imperial. This is just another example of disingenuous dishonesty to lay the blame for such laws at the EU's door.

Ultimately traders will use what makes sense to their customers.

ClosedAccountFuzzy

Not to mention that the entire rest of the Commonwealth, including countries like Canada, Australia & New Zealand embraced the metric system fully decades ago. It’s nothing to do with the EU, other than that it’s part of keeping a single market flowing with standard units for trade, and formal metrication began in the U.K. back in 1965, almost a decade before they joined the EEC. They’ve also been discussing and attempting to do it since at least 1818.

To me that whole debate is just anti-science. SI Units are very much a product of the Enlightenment. They underpin the very basis of accessible science and they make calculating everyday things much easier, more accessible and are basically a tool of reason, numeracy and modernity.

The ham fisted way they went about enforcing metric measures on traders as their sole measurement was entirely their own domestic doing and rather than embrace it the toxic tabloids turned it into a politicised nonsense fight.

Nobody under 50 will even have a clear grasp of how any of those legacy units work either, as they haven’t been taught in school for decades. It’s nationalistic nostalgia.

The League of Gentlemen’s Local Shop for Local People has, unfortunately, become reality.

I suppose they should go back to non decimal currency too. That would really be a shot in the arm (or the foot) for the economy.

CelticRambler

lawred2 wrote: »

It shouldn't be an offence though should it!? But the fact that it's an offence is a UK matter.

That fact that it's an offence arises from the need to define what is and isn't legal for trade, and to penalise infractions. Every unit that is defined needs to have a reference standard kept somewhere, against which the inspectors can validate their scales/ruler/measuring jug. Allowing multiple different units to be legal increases the workload for inspectors and creates more opportunities for fraud. So, from a domestic point of view, it makes sense to simplify the range of units listed as legal for trade.

But as it happens, the UK introduced metric units in the Weights and Measures of Act 1897 ; and the EU granted a permanent exemption to the requirement to go all metric in 2007, recognising Britons' peculiar attachment to unwieldy units. All-in-all, then, there's nothing "EU" about it, and no new freedom as a result of Brexit. Quelle surprise. :rolleyes:

rock22

FuzzyThinking wrote: »

...

.
Nobody under 50 will even have a clear grasp of how any of those legacy units work either,.

I suppose they should go back to non decimal currency too. That would really be a shot in the arm (or the foot) for the economy.

Then the English shopkeeper can get back to the good old days when he would compute the cost 2 and half ounces of sweets at £1/3/11 per lbs.
( hint 16 ounces in lb 12 d in S 20 S in £ - and no I haven't worked it out either!)

[QUOTE=CelticRambler;117516507..

But as it happens, the UK introduced metric units in the Weights and Measures of Act 1897 ; and the EU granted a permanent exemption to the requirement to go all metric in 2007, recognising Britons' peculiar attachment to unwieldy units. All-in-all, then, there's nothing "EU" about it, and no new freedom as a result of Brexit. Quelle surprise. :rolleyes:[/QUOTE]

Igotadose

rock22 wrote: »

Then the English shopkeeper can get back to the good old days when he would compute the cost 2 and half ounces of sweets at £1/3/11 per lbs.
( hint 16 ounces in lb 12 d in S 20 S in £ - and no I haven't worked it out either!)

Does that mean all kinds of new (old) coinage in the UK as well? Farthings/crowns/...

A friend, older Irish woman who'd grown up in the UK, once tried to explain to me how the old coin worked in the UK. My head was spinning by the time she was done, base 12 sometimes, base 10, fractions,.... Crazy!

But, sovereignty I guess. Blue passports, paper-wrapped fish and farthings.

yagan

rock22 wrote: »

Then the English shopkeeper can get back to the good old days when he would compute the cost 2 and half ounces of sweets at £1/3/11 per lbs.
( hint 16 ounces in lb 12 d in S 20 S in £ - and no I haven't worked it out either!)

It was even simpler than having to calculate when you could take the coin float at the end of the day and simply weigh it to get its value.

The pound symbol is derived from the Roman weight for a pound, the libre. Italy's lira also used the two horizontal barred symbol. D was the symbol for pence because it was derived from denarius.

Essentially the British coinage of their past is actually an earlier European standard. They'll have to come up with a new standard now, the Bojo or something.

ClosedAccountFuzzy

There are various historical measures accepted as secondary units, defined legally in metric equivalents. Our pint glass, various wine bottles, barrels, certain beer bottles etc all across the continent are preserved for cultural reasons.

It’s just another dose of jingoistic contrarianism that seeks to define nationality by clutching at idiosyncratic minutiae.

It screams of an insecurity about national identity and place in the world when you’re getting teary eyed about your weird plugs and trying to reinstate obsolete units like °F and calculating fuel consumption in Rods to the Hogshead just out of sheer bloody mindedness.

Everything ends up as being a politically loaded symbol.

pixelburp

Were the UK a person I'd be at the point where I might wonder if they're having a nervous breakdown.

The Imperial nonsense is the eye catcher but TBH the whole suite of recommendations look like a recipe for a right wingers, deregulated paradise. "Cutting the red tape" is unsubtle code for ripping up every piece of consumer or industry protection, ensuring a decrease in everything from building standards to environmental protection. This is and has been the aim of Brexit IMO from its cheerleader class: disaster capitalism to enrich a few, those who can take advantage of a firesale of Britain's protections, no longer protected by EU oversight.

yagan

FuzzyThinking wrote: »

There are various historical measures accepted as secondary units, defined legally in metric equivalents. Our pint glass, various wine bottles, barrels, certain beer bottles etc all across the continent are preserved for cultural reasons.

It’s just another dose of jingoistic contrarianism that seeks to define nationality by clutching at idiosyncratic minutiae.

It screams of an insecurity about national identity and place in the world when you’re getting teary eyed about your weird plugs and trying to reinstate obsolete units like °F and calculating fuel consumption in Rods to the Hogshead just out of sheer bloody mindedness.

Everything ends up as being a politically loaded symbol.

From the wiki on Cargo Culture

A cargo cult is a indigenist millenarian belief system in which adherents perform rituals which they believe will cause a more technologically advanced society to deliver goods. These cults were first described in Melanesia in the wake of contact with allied military forces during the Second World War.

While Germany and France move on with co authorship of the their school history syllabus Britain stays stuck in WWI and WWII.

Sam Russell

rock22 wrote: »

Then the English shopkeeper can get back to the good old days when he would compute the cost 2 and half ounces of sweets at £1/3/11 per lbs.
( hint 16 ounces in lb 12 d in S 20 S in £ - and no I haven't worked it out either!)

Well, people I know who grew up with the crazy pre-metric system told me they were taught mental arithmetic and could do such calculations in their head in moments.

By the way, I would think that, for example, sweets were sold in 4 oz and weighed out in front of you, and priced in that measure. The modern way is to place the product in a plastic sealed bag or a block (such as chocolate) in paper or plastic with an ever shrinking size, but increasing cost per unit, disguised by the odd weight written in blue ink on a purple background. At least when it was weighed, you knew what you were getting and the price.

Given that most produce these days is prepacked, and the weight is not defined in law, this opens the seller to practice deception.

In Ireland butter must be sold in pounds and half pounds - this is to stop 'shaving' where the amount in the packet gradually reduces as happens with jam for example. Jam used to always come in 1 lb jars, or 454 grams (or perhaps 450 grams), but more common now is 12 oz or even 10 oz. Bread must be sold in either 800 grams or 400 grams, or the weight must be shown. Obviously unwrapped bread must comply, but again I notice bread weights are going off standard - for example a loaf bought the other day in Tesco is marked 505g.

We need to take weights and measures more seriously, but not like the Uk going back to firkins and hogsheads or barrels. We should have predicted weights for most produce used, such as bread, flour, butter, sugar, milk, prepacked vegetables, etc.

Perhaps the EU should regulate it.

RobMc59

pixelburp wrote: »

Were the UK a person I'd be at the point where I might wonder if they're having a nervous breakdown.

The Imperial nonsense is the eye catcher but TBH the whole suite of recommendations look like a recipe for a right wingers, deregulated paradise. "Cutting the red tape" is unsubtle code for ripping up every piece of consumer or industry protection, ensuring a decrease in everything from building standards to environmental protection. This is and has been the aim of Brexit IMO from its cheerleader class: disaster capitalism to enrich a few, those who can take advantage of a firesale of Britain's protections, no longer protected by EU oversight.

I sometimes feel like I'm having a breakdown with the madness of brexit.
The 'pure' brexit those who orchestrated the whole thing is unobtainable if you want to continue trading with your biggest market amicably.
The mention of a return to imperial weights and measures has surely got to be more drivel from the likes of the express.Although as Sam mentioned both the UK especially and to a lesser extent Ireland still have a strange unoffficial hybrid method of weights and measures .I don't know anyone who said 'I'm just nipping out for a swift half a litre'!

ClosedAccountFuzzy

That’s because a pint is a traditional measure. You can find that in wine too.

187.5 ml is used for small champagne bottles for example.

There are oddly non round measures used for various historical reasons and others were just converted to metric by rounding to the nearest round figure.

It typically doesn’t matter as long as the measures are also in an SI unit for comparison and standards to prevent ripoffs.

We cling to some stupid ones like a lb of butter marked as 454g, instead of just rounding the damn thing to 500g for simplicity.

Sugar was all switched like that.

You still see pints / 2 pint milk containers in England. We’ve long since switched to round metric measure, and I don’t think anyone particularly cared or even noticed.

The metric system is only difficult to some traditionalists in Britain & the US because some people insisted on using US traditional or imperial measures awkwardly converted to odd values, rather than just using round numbers.

We also use MPG references here which make no sense as petrol isn’t sold in gallons and we don’t use miles and often they’re totally wrong as they’re using US or imperial gallons interchangeable…

It’s just indulging the awkward in my view. Trainspotter / stamp collector approach to policy making.

Sam Russell

RobMc59 wrote: »

I sometimes feel like I'm having a breakdown with the madness of brexit.
The 'pure' brexit those who orchestrated the whole thing is unobtainable if you want to continue trading with your biggest market amicably.
The mention of a return to imperial weights and measures has surely got to be more drivel from the likes of the express.Although as Sam mentioned both the UK especially and to a lesser extent Ireland still have a strange unoffficial hybrid method of weights and measures .I don't know anyone who said 'I'm just nipping out for a swift half a litre'!

That is just colloquial language. I am sure you have heard of people rushing out 'to spend a penny'.
It is a long time since anyone charged a penny for what they are rushing out for.

Also, 'swift half' is an English expression. In Ireland we drink 'a pint' or 'a glass' of beer or stout and it is never swift.

Although we do have a hybrid system, it is all basically metric in reality. All product is marked in grams or kilos.

yagan

Sam Russell wrote: »

That is just colloquial language. I am sure you have heard of people rushing out 'to spend a penny'.
It is a long time since anyone charged a penny for what they are rushing out for.

Also, 'swift half' is an English expression. In Ireland we drink 'a pint' or 'a glass' of beer or stout and it is never swift.

Although we do have a hybrid system, it is all basically metric in reality. All product is marked in grams or kilos.

I used to think of my weight in stones but since I've started using Kg on my bathroom scales I can't not think in metric, same with distances.

They're still going to have to use metric for their exports though so it's not going to go away. The only nations not using metric are the USA and Liberia I think.

fly_agaric

In fairness there's alot more to that TIGRR report than the paragraph about Metric/Imperial units. It appears in a sort of grab-bag section at the end called "Further Important Reforms".
What areas to diverge from the EU in and how to go about that are vital questions for the UK. They really need to make good decisions about that.

It may just be some civil servant's joke or an effort at stroking the prejudices of likes of Sir Iain Duncan Smith but fact that rubbish like that is in a Government report at all (instead of the Express, as RobMc59 poster mentioned) is not encouraging. The Brexit revolutionaries are not suited to be deciding these questions.

They have a bad allergy to the EU and "the continent" more generally.
This also comes across in other parts of the report with the trumpetting of English "Common Law" as superior for regulations but without giving very good arguments why (IMO).

These people are just as likely to choose a poinlesss or harmful area to diverge from the EU for the sake of it/to provoke more rows with the EU as to do something that will be in the UKs best interests. Fundametally they can't accept they actually "won" and maybe only thing that will satisfy them is a collapse of the EU. The UK does not have the power to make that happen from the outside and they should also be very, very careful what they wish for.

fly_agaric

lawred2 wrote: »

It shouldn't be an offence though should it!? But the fact that it's an offence is a UK matter. There's no such offence in Ireland that compels the use of metric over Imperial. This is just another example of disingenuous dishonesty to lay the blame for such laws at the EU's door.

Ultimately traders will use what makes sense to their customers.

They reference a specific case in footnotes for the nutty section about Metric/Imperial.
I found a wiki page about it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thoburn_v_Sunderland_City_Council

The wiki claims origin of the UKs law was an EU (EEC) Directive, so does that not mean we must have a similar law about using metric somewhere on the books in Ireland (even if no one has been taken to court for breaking it)?

yagan

fly_agaric wrote: »

These people are just as likely to choose a poinlesss or harmful area to diverge from the EU for the sake of it/to provoke more rows with the EU as to do something that will be in the UKs best interests. Fundametally they can't accept they actually "won" and maybe only thing that will satisfy them is a collapse of the EU. The UK does not have the power to make that happen from the outside and they should also be very, very careful what they wish for.

It really seems they're diverging from the modern world, reverting to the past. That whole business of trying to reestablish dominance by intentionally making the aussie trade rep sit for hours in an uncomfortable seat was pure cringeworthy.

Most worryingly this whole nostalgic revanchism is not good for minorities in England.

rock22

yagan wrote: »

It really seems they're diverging from the modern world, reverting to the past. That whole business of trying to reestablish dominance by intentionally making the aussie trade rep sit for hours in an uncomfortable seat was pure cringeworthy.

Most worryingly this whole nostalgic revanchism is not good for minorities in England.

Yes it is very much a symptom or reverting to the Imperial past.
For what it is worth, both inch ( & yard and mile) and pound (av) are secondary standards defined in reference to the metre and kilogram

So while it is more convenient to consider length in multiples of meters the UK prefers to use multiples of 0.914 metres. Each to his own.

I remember , as a school child, having great pride in the Irish mile being longer than the English one. Thankfully i have grown out of such foolishness

joeysoap

Wales will play Denmark today in the Netherlands. on a pitch marked out in metres . The world has moved from Imperial measurements, no problem.

yagan

joeysoap wrote: »

Wales will play Denmark today in the Netherlands. on a pitch marked out in metres . The world has moved from Imperial measurements, no problem.

We still measure divisions of GAA pitches in yards, but that more a reflection of the time when the basics were set out.

It would probably make sense to round off to a metric measure as I really can't think of anywhere else I encounter it.

Strazdas

Interesting article from Tony Connelly today. He suggests that Frost and Johnson actively want the Irish Protocol to go badly, for there to be tension and strife with the EU and a scenario where the Protocol was working well would be a very bad outcome in their eyes.

Rather than responding to unionist fears, Connelly reckons Frost is deliberately stoking them.

CelticRambler

Strazdas wrote: »

Interesting article from Tony Connelly today. He suggests that Frost and Johnson actively want the Irish Protocol to go badly, for there to be tension and strife with the EU and a scenario where the Protocol was working well would be a very bad outcome in their eyes.

Assuming it's this one that you're referring to, yes, there are some interesting observations:

Through that lens, Frost’s handling of the Protocol starts to make sense.

If he gives in to the idea of aligning with EU food safety rules, even to get rid of 80% of checks and controls on the Irish Sea, and even temporarily, then his vision of Brexit unravels.

If a narrative emerges that a sizable percentage of Northern Ireland stakeholders are willing to accept the Protocol, or even to benefit from it, because it gives those businesses unfettered access both the EU’s single market and the UK internal market, then his vision of Brexit is undermined again.

...

if the DUP lose seats next year, and the Assembly then votes by a majority in 2024 to continue with the Protocol, then that, too, would undermine Frost’s vision of Brexit.

In other words, Johnson-Frost's Brexit Britain is such a fragile construction that anything positive for NI, one of the constituent nations of the UK, is seen as a threat. That doesn't bode well for the global buccaneering we've been promised.

Tyrone212

I think the best thing for everyone would be for Boris to be replaced asap. When you have a chancer and joker in charge it will just be a constant stream of bs devoid of reality.

RobMc59

Strazdas wrote: »

Interesting article from Tony Connelly today. He suggests that Frost and Johnson actively want the Irish Protocol to go badly, for there to be tension and strife with the EU and a scenario where the Protocol was working well would be a very bad outcome in their eyes.

Rather than responding to unionist fears, Connelly reckons Frost is deliberately stoking them.

I sometimes wonder what is most important to the EU,the protocol or the GFA.If the protocol goes badly would th EU want to construct a border wall saying the UK made us do it,risking the wrath of the superpower that is the US?
That could be how Johnson and co want it to play out.

ClosedAccountFuzzy

RobMc59 wrote: »

I sometimes wonder what is most important to the EU,the protocol or the GFA.If the protocol goes badly would th EU want to construct a border wall saying the UK made us do it,risking the wrath of the superpower that is the US?
That could be how Johnson and co want it to play out.

Can’t really see that being likely. The Biden administration are no fans of Boris, who is just seen as a British Trump.

CelticRambler

RobMc59 wrote: »

I sometimes wonder what is most important to the EU,the protocol or the GFA.

The Protocol, without a doubt. It represents the whole of the Brexit negotiations, supposedly carried out in good faith, so for the UK government to ignore it's obligations in respect of GB->NI trade, and the EU to let that slide, would be a sign to all of the EU's other trade partners that any restrictive T&Cs written into their own agreements weren't worth the paper they were written on.

Most of the GFA is now hard-wired into the local socio-cultural landscape in NI/RoI, so it's a lot more robust than some agitators would have you believe. The NI Protocol was crafted to align with the GFA because the EU had a potential problem with the integrity of the Single Market and an uncooperative former member, and the Irish Sea provided a convenient, easy-to-police demarcation line.

RobMc59

correct horse battery staple wrote: »

Or they could just collapse uk exports at Calais reminding Boris the purpose of the agreement

Would the EU be likely to do that or trigger art 16?
An unswerving dogmatic approach could play into Johnson's hands as an EU enforced border between NI and Ireland would put the EU in the pantomime villains position which brexiteers would exploit.

Strazdas

RobMc59 wrote: »

I sometimes wonder what is most important to the EU,the protocol or the GFA.If the protocol goes badly would th EU want to construct a border wall saying the UK made us do it,risking the wrath of the superpower that is the US?
That could be how Johnson and co want it to play out.

The Protocol has to be their priority as they see it as maintaining the integrity of the EU Single Market (which is 100% their responsibility). Yes, they want to protect the GFA too, but that is out of deference to one of the member states - the external EU border has to be the No.1 priority.