Pippa Musgrave Profile picture
Sep 16, 2021 12 tweets 2 min read Read on X
@BorisJohnson Hello Boris. Weights and Measures Inspector here. Sorry to dispel your latest bit of kite flying.

1. The UK transferring to metric measures had bugger all to do with our EU membership. (1)
2. The UK agreed, when it signed the OIML treaty in 1856 to move to a single system of measurement (S.I. units). Metric measures have been lawful in the UK since 1875. (2)
3. Are you proposing the UK leaves the OIML treaty? (3)
4. Only Myanmar and the USA currently use imperial measures (US measures are actually slightly different). How does this play with your claim of 'Global Britain'? (4)
5. We have a national shortage of Weights and Measures Inspectors. Are you going to pay for new inspectors to be trained (which currently takes 6 years)?
6. Certificates of approval for imperial metrological equipment have long since lapsed. Will you subsidise the industry cost of certification?
Most imperial local standards and testing equipment have long been retired. Will you subsidise Local Authorities for the cost of this equipment and the creation of new metrological laboratories?
A local standard mass comparator costs £30,000. Are you willing to spend many millions of pounds reintroducing such equipment?
Imperial measurements have not been taught in schools since the mid 1970s. Indeed, to have been taught imperial measures, consumers are likely now retired? Are you willing to invest many more millions in educating the UK population of imperial measures?
Or is this, like your Bridge to Ireland, a nonsense policy only to distract form the appalling way you are running this country?
Finally, the USA is a member of NAFTA, where both Canada and Mexico use the metric system. This has meant increased visibility of metric markings on US goods. The US is a signatory of the OIML treaty. Interest in metric is growing in the USA
For clarity, the OIML treaty has been updated and is now called the METRE convention. The UK remains a signatory.

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More from @PippaMusgrave1

Sep 4
@mrjamesob Following the announcement of the Grenfell Tower report, I thought I would pass on my experience. As you know I was a senior trading standards officer made redundant in 2010, one of the first to go as a result of Cameron's austerity cuts.
I joined the profession in 1991. Whilst carrying out my professional training, trading standards was given the responsibility for the enforcement of the EU wide Construction Products regulations.
I personally thought Trading Standards was an odd fit and the regulations would be better enforced by Building Control or the HSE.
Read 19 tweets
May 29, 2022
@mrjamesob @BBC The article below is baloney. The EU had nothing to with metrication in 2000. It was UK government policy altering UK law (Weights & Measures Act 1985 and the Price Marking Order 1974) bbc.co.uk/news/61621893
I should know, I was a weights and inspector heavily involved in advising traders and carrying out enforcement of the changeover.
What the EU did do, around the same time, was open up the market for equipment certification, i.e. the CE mark on pint glasses. This meant manufacturers could certify their equipment in any EU state and sell it across the EU
Read 4 tweets
May 27, 2022
@mrjamesob We need joined up thinking. It isn't the number of jobs but also the types of jobs. An example near me: (1)
There was a piece of land near me zoned for employment, preferably higher salary artisan and professional roles. This was to be low impact due to traffic concerns. (2)
Instead councillors allowed the land to be a discount supermarket. There are already four other supermarkets nearby. The new supermarket creates ten additional jobs at or near minimum wage, not the higher end, high productivity jobs planned (3)
Read 4 tweets
Sep 23, 2021
@mrjamesob Catching up on your programme on Imperial measures. You got lots of things wrong. I will explain (1)
Metrication was nothing to do with the EU or the Single Market. It goes way back to an International treaty the UK signed in 1856. Subsequently this treaty was modernised and it is now called the METRE Convention.
The 1856 treaty aimed to create a single system of measurement worldwide. That system S.I units was to be used for everything from trade to science to engineering to medicine.
Read 13 tweets
Jan 1, 2021
@mrjamesob Right, as I'm working on the NI protocol at the moment, Facts. Goods from NI to GB face few checks and little paperwork (only compliance with international treaties like CITES and Kimberley Diamonds) (1)
@mrjamesob You cannot deliberately route goods from Ireland, through NI to GB if your aim is to avoid taxes or duties (that is smuggling and HMRC anti-avoidance teams are in place) (2)
@mrjamesob As Northern Ireland is in the EU customs territory and follows EU regulatory standards, you can route goods from the EEA to NI as you did prior to Brexit. You can use GB as a land bridge as long as you follow the Common Transit Convention protocols (3)
Read 21 tweets
Jul 25, 2019
@mrjamesob I know I'm talking to the knowledgeable but in any case a thread (1)
@mrjamesob I sat and listened to Boris Johnson's statement to parliament today agog. Following on from his choices of carpetbaggers, opportunists and zealots to the cabinet and his choice to place the Vote Leave staff in Downing St, it's clear that this country is in very choppy waters (2)
@mrjamesob Like you I know my history and I am extremely concerned at the fascistic posturing used by Johnson. If we are not careful we are in for a far right autocracy in this country and it is the duty of moderate Tories everywhere to stand up for this country over party affiliation (3)
Read 15 tweets

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