A 64-year-old mother of two has become Britain’s latest “metric martyr”, after being found guilty of selling fruit and vegetables in pounds and ounces, rather than kilos and grams.
Jane Devers, a market trader from Dalston in East London, was ordered to pay £5,000 in costs and handed a criminal record after her stall was swooped on by Hackney Council.
She was convicted of eight offences under the Weights and Measures act, including use of the imperial scale without proper labelling and the sale of vegetables for £1 a bowl, rather than in an exact measurement - both of which are common practices amongst the country’s 40,000 strong market stall operators.
Devers was given a two-year conditional discharge at Thames Magistrates Court, but chairman of the bench Patrick Davies said: 'We note that you said you were doing this in the interests of your customers, although you ought to have known you were breaking the law in doing so."
A “flabbergasted” Devers told the media: “I have been made a scapegoat. To get a criminal record for this is absolutely outrageous.”
The European Commission blamed British authorities for over zealous application of laws that the EC says are not intended to criminalise people.
And the case provoked angry reaction from respondents to the story on national media websites. Comments suggested that the English judiciary might be better focusing on more serious trading issues, such as counterfeiting, and that imperial measures should still be allowed. One consumer said: “It isn’t a question of whether or not Britain should retain its imperial measures. The point is who runs our country now? When are we going to wake up to the takeover by Brussels?”
