Supporters of consumer protection have been alarmed at reports suggesting that the Government is to tell local councils not to enforce aspects of weights and measures law. Can this really be true?
Various newspapers and broadcasters have reported alleged comments by Secretary of State John Denham that he intends to “introduce new guidelines within months that would prevent local authorities from taking traders to court” (for offences connected with using illegal scales, and weighing and pricing in illegal measures). See for example BBC report http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7677438.stm.
In fact this report makes little sense. Mr Denham cannot change a law that has been passed by the UK Parliament, nor can he require Trading Standards Authorities (TSAs) not to enforce it. Indeed the existing guidance to TSAs, which is issued by the Local Authorities Co-ordinators of Regulatory Services (LACORS) in consultation with the Mr Denham’s Department (which can be downloaded from http://www.lacors.gov.uk/lacors/ContentDetails.aspx?id=17089), already recommends that enforcement action should be “proportionate”. See for example, paragraph 3.1:
“3.1 Local Authorities must continue to demonstrate their commitment to consistent, proportionate action to ensure that those remaining traders who continue to trade in imperial units through ignorance of the law or misleading media coverage, do convert to selling in metric units, and to ensure that cohesive action is taken over any remaining high profile traders who refuse as a point of principle to comply.”
The debate, of course, is about what constitutes “proportionate” action, and the LACORS guidance makes it clear that prosecution should be a seldom used last resort. It is difficult to see how any new advice (whether from LACORS or the Government itself) could go any further in discouraging prosecution without actually telling them not to enforce the law.
With regard to the legality of non-enforcement, the LACORS guidance continues:
“3.6 Authorities are advised to have regard to the provisions of Counselâ??s Opinion in relation to the duty to enforce. The relevant points provide that Local Authorities may not decline to perform their statutory duties under the Act, thus, whilst they enjoy discretion whether or not to prosecute in an individual case, that discretion may not be used to justify a general policy of non-prosecution and must be exercised reasonably. The Code for Crown Prosecutors advises that prosecutors must not be affected by improper or undue pressure from any source and Counsel advises that the exercise of the discretion not to prosecute, principally in order to avoid potential political difficulties, might well amount to â??improperâ?? or â??undueâ?? pressure.”
So local Councils may not have a policy of non-enforcement, and the Secretary of State cannot legally encourage Councils not to enforce the law.
Perhaps the most charitable interpretation is that Mr Denham was caught off guard and made some ill thought-out, populist remarks, leaving his civil servants to try to limit the damage.
UKMA will be writing to Mr Denham seeking clarification of his alleged comments and inviting him to confirm that he does not condone law-breaking or failure to enforce the law.
According to “The Times� Mr Denham said “It is hard to see how it is in the public interest, or in the interests of consumers, to prosecute small traders who have committed what are essentially minor offences. I would like to see an end to this kind of prosecution, which is why I have asked for new guidance to be introduced.�
The BBC text (which paraphrased Mr Denham’s statement rather than quoting it verbatim) said “The Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills said Innovations Secretary John Denham would introduce new guidelines within months that would prevent local authorities from taking traders to court.�
There is a world of difference between the two statements – the phrase “this kind of prosecution� in Mr Denham’s statement could well refer to the current use of crown courts where the use of magistrates courts are appropriate. It could also mean that there is some other change in the offing that would dramatically alter the whole way in which weights and measures legislation is administered and which would provide a “fast track� means of prosecuting people who, to use Mr Denham’s words, are committing “minor offences�.
One would think that the media would learn from its past mistakes. But it never does and keeps on repeating the same fictions in order to make them appear true. If anything a change in the way market traders are charged will be welcome so that the media will be hard pressed to insist they were charged for “selling a pound of bananas”. As long as they are charged with other offences that have the same effect as to get the non-metric scales out of public view, then any change in the way the prosecutions are handled would be welcome.
Another move could be for the local authorities to deal with the issue locally and keep the issue out of the courts. The offenders would be fined and prevented from demanding a trial or at least a trial by jury in front of the media.
The media may have taken the intent the exact opposite way John Denham may have intended. Only time will tell.
I speculate that Neil Herron (leader of the so called “metric martyrs” campaign) knows deep down that John Denham’s alleged initiative is just hot air. Indeed he qualified his early reaction by ackowledging that mere guidance is insufficient.
As someone firmly on the side of progress in metrication I naturally baulk at his suggestion that a change of law is needed. However if he does manage to persuade MP’s to table an amendment at least it will get them to confront the issue and start a public debate on the subject. Maybe then the truth will be told.
I think Martin has this exactly right in the sense that, even if his suggestions don’t match what Mr Denham actually meant, UKMA and allies can direct the discussion and reframe it publicly so that the minister will gladly (if he was uncertain which direction to go in or had not even thought it through) or begrudgingly (if he was thinking about putting a stop, even de facto, to all prosecutions) accept the direction suggested by Martin so that he ends up having no choice but to propose those streamlined measures that will still realistically allow for continued enforcement and prosecutions.
In my view, this needs to be part of the political jiu-jitsu that UKMA and allies should vigorously pursue without delay.
This BBC article is pretty poor and not well researched. This part in particular:
“Last year the EU ruled that the UK could carry on using imperial measures, but some councils have continued to take action against people doing so.”
Is wrong – the key part missing being ‘alongside metric measures as a secondary indicator and must be smaller than the metric price’. This reads as though traders don’t have to use metric measurements at all! The article goes on to perpetuate this misleading information.
And this part particularly irritates me: ‘traders unwilling to bend to the EU legislation’, when it was the UK alone that decided to adopt a single, sensible system of weights and measures – the metric system – before Britain joined the EU.
These types of articles from the media are wearing thin, and I think we have more pressing problems to worry about than this.
Whatever the rights and wrongs in Mr Denham’s statement, we will now see a repeat of what happened after Mr Verheigen’s statement last year – the press will not retract or correct their errors and more market traders (who will be more likely to follow the advice of the funny papers than the actual law) will switch to imperial only.
We clearly all hoped that the TSO’s victory in this case would have put this issue to bed for once and for all and should have given other TSO’s considerably more influence now that traders know that they’re not going to win if they continue to defy the law. However, unless the government can be made to clarify this statement quickly it’s only going to be more of the same.
At the bottom of the barrage of confusion thrown up by this weekend’s press reporting and letters is the deliberate confusion between what people ask for and what they receive.
Whether people ask for 4 bananas, a pound of bananas or half a kilo (in the UK or anywhere else) doesn’t matter very much and of course is not regulated by Brussels or anyone else. What they should receive is what they pay for – a given weight of banana, priced accordingly. I am none the wiser as to which minister or government spokesperson said what to whom in response to what question, but I hope this basic distinction isn’t lost on the government. It’s not rocket science but it’s vital to consumer protection.
Here is where the rubber meets the road in the LACORS guidance to TSOs (as cited above in the main post):
Section 3.6 (in part)
” The Code for Crown Prosecutors advises that prosecutors must not be affected by improper or undue pressure from ANY SOURCE (my emphasis) and Counsel advises that the exercise of the discretion not to prosecute, principally in order to avoid potential political difficulties, might well amount to ‘improper’ or ‘undue’ pressure.”
The question is how UKMA can help frame the debate so that it stops being an issue of “free speech” or “London vs. Brussels” and becomes one of harmonization with global (not just EU) standards in a global economy and adoption of a standard that makes just as much sense (in fact, more so) than decimalization of the currency did. (Who would sanely advocate that Lsd should have been allowed indefinitely in place of or even alongside of decimal pounds and pence?)
Is the BBC in breach of its charter by publishing the report referenced above? (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7677438.stm.) Article 4 of the BBC’s charter reads:
4. The Public Purposes
The Public Purposes of the BBC are as follows—
(a) sustaining citizenship and civil society;
(b) promoting education and learning;
(c) stimulating creativity and cultural excellence;
(d) representing the UK, its nations, regions and communities;
(e) bringing the UK to the world and the world to the UK;
(f ) in promoting its other purposes, helping to deliver to the public the
benefit of emerging communications technologies and services and, in
addition, taking a leading role in the switchover to digital television.
I believe that much of this particular BBC report can be classified as “half-truths” which result in “disinformation” being propagated which is at variance with 4(b) of the charter.
The full charter can be found at http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/framework/charter.html.
The BBC also has an agreement with the Minister for Culture, Media and Sport. Article 6(1) of that agreement (available on the same web site as above) requires that the BBC give “accurate and impartial news, other information and analysis of current events and ideas.
Again, this article appears to be in full breach of that clause.