Posted on 07/20/2008 9:15:56 PM PDT by bruinbirdman
The acre, one of Britain's historic imperial measurements, is to be banned from use under a new European directive.
The measurement, which will officially be replaced by the hectare, will no longer be allowed when land is being registered.
After being agreed last week, the new ruling will come into force in January 2010.
The Tories are angry that unlike some other EU countries, who sent Cabinet-level ministers to the meeting on 15 July, the Government only sent Jonathan Shaw, a junior minister at the Department for Environment Farming and Rural Affairs, to represent Britain's interests.
Mark Francois, the Shadow Europe Minister said: "It is this kind of pointless interference into the nooks and crannies of our national life that frustrates people about the EU. Whether we use hectares or acres should be a matter for Britain to decide, not the EU.
"Once again this weak Labour Government has meekly given up yet another of Britain's rights to Brussels. They need to think again and insist that we must keep our right to use our ancient traditional measure of land if we wish."
A hectare is the equivalent of 2.471 acres; the acre, one of Britain's most ancient units, measures 4,840 square yards.
The first law setting out the exact statutory size for the acre was passed in the early 14th century under Edward I. It is derived from an even older English word, related to the Latin "ager", from which words such as agriculture are derived.
Britain had, until now, an opt-out from the European Union's use of metric measurements which allowed the use of acres to continue.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
This will bring the British Empire to it’s knees. /s
Absolutely right. Those countries gave up a lot of soveriegnty. Personally, I wish we in the US would switch over to meters, kilograms, and liters. Much easier to work with and you don't have to have nearly as many wrenches.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
At least they're not sending a racist, Marxist junior Senator to the Presidency, unlike some others on this planet.
One by one, centimeter by centimeter, the nations of New Europe surrender their distinctive identities.
They have preserved only one tradition.
They all hate American Conservatives.
Does anyone remember, “Metric Mike?”
Big deal... Calculators are cheap nowadays -- and conversion factors are readily available on the internet.
Remember back roughly twenty years ago when the metric craze was brought on in this country by the metric crazies. Politician bought onto the craze. Highway signs were in both English and metric.
All gone!!!!!!
Thank God! It was stupid and cost a lot of money and no one liked it or paid any attention to it.
Furthermore, as has been previously posted, conversion calculators are readily available on the net and are very easy to use.
They should have just switched to arpents.
And, for those who aren’t familiar with land measurements, an arpent is about .85 acre (and apparently the FR spell checker hasn’t ever looked at Louisiana land records).
Ping to some notorious wisehectares.
Every time I look at a Canadian road sign I have to multiply 8/5ths. What will they do with the PLSS all built on miles and acres?
Yeah, then the speed limit would be 105.
yitbos
And how long befor e some idiot with a mph speedometer tried to go at that speed?
Drought threatens water supply of more than a million Australians
yitbos
UK and USA should switch to the metric system to be honest, but I do agree that it should be up to the ppl in thsoe country to decide
I resemble that.
“Canada has been metric since 1975.”
And, we’ve learned if you give them 2.54 centimeters; they’ll take 1.6 kilometers.
The error goes both ways. See my post at #19.
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