Weights and Measures Acts (UK)

It also refers to similar royal and parliamentary acts of the Kingdoms of England and Scotland and the medieval Welsh states.

The earliest of these were originally untitled but were given descriptive glosses or titles based upon the monarch under whose reign they were promulgated.

There have been many laws concerned with weights and measures in the United Kingdom or parts of it over the last 1,000 or so years.

As of 25 April 2012, the current primary legislation in the United Kingdom is the 1985 act, which was last amended by statutory instrument in 2011.

[4] The act is currently enforced by the 200 Trading Standards offices managed by local authorities around the country.

As part of its attempt to harmonise units of measure between the member states of its Internal Market, the European Commission (EC) issued directive 80/181/EEC which set out the units of measure that should be used for what it called "economic, public health, public safety, and administrative" purposes.

For example, it was the Trading Standards Office that criticised the use of sub-standard weighing machines in NHS hospitals.

The initial intention was to prohibit dual labelling after the end of 1989, with metric units only being allowed after that date.

Finally, in 2007, the European Union (EU, as it had become) and the EC confirmed that the UK would be permitted to continue indefinitely to use imperial units such as pints, miles, pounds and ounces as at present.

[12] The Gloucestershire County Council Trading Standards Department confirmed the EU ruling that the previous deadline for ending dual labelling had been abolished.

[13] There are still a few cases where imperial units are required to be used and where metric units are not permitted within the scope of the Weights and Measures Act, such as the pint for the sale of draught beer and cider, and miles and yards for distances on road signage.

Milk in returnable containers may be sold by the pint and the troy ounce may be used for the sale of precious metals.

2 Edgar c. 8 (959 x 963):[15] The statute also survives in a few other Old English and Latin copies, some which omit mention of London and describe "the measure held at Winchester", an indication that a standard ell or yard was nominally in use:[16][17] John Quincy Adams's 1821 report on the history of English weights and measures notes of this act that "it was never observed".

Per Ordinacionem tocius regni Anglie fuit mensura Domini Regis composita videlicet quod denarius qui vocatur sterlingus rotundus & sine tonsura ponderabit triginta duo grana frumenti in medio Spice.

Per Ordinance of the whole realm of England the measure of the King is composed namely of a penny, which is called a sterling, round & without clipping, weighs thirty-two grains of wheat in the middle of the Ear.

Saccus lane debet ponderare viginti & octo petras & solebat ponderare unam summam frumenti & ponderat sextam partem unius carri de plumbo.

sexies viginti petre faciunt carrum plumbi scilicet magnum carrum London’ set carrus del Peek est multo minus.Item carrus plumbi constat ex triginta fotmallis & quodlibet fotmal continet sex petras duabus libris minus.

petre & probetur per sexies triginta que sunt novies viginti set in quolibet fotmal subtrahuntur due libre a predicta multiplicacione qe sunt lx.

secundum vero quosdam alios le Carre consistit ex xii.

Weya enim tam plumbi quam lane lini sepi casei ponderabunt xiiii.

paria cirotecarum.Item centena cere zucarii piperis cumini amigdalarum & alome continet xiii.

Et sciend’ quod quelibet libra de denariis & speciebus utpote in electuariis consistit solummodo ex pondere xx.

s. Libra vero omnium aliarum rerum consistit ex viginti quinque solidis.

Centena lini & Canabi & linee tele consistit ex cent’ ulnis.

Duodena ferri ex sex peciis Item seem vitri constat ex xxiiii.

Et quelibet stik ex viginti quinque anguillis Binda pellium continet xxxii.

Item centene Mulvellorum & durorum piscium constat ex viii.

Also a hundred of wax, sugar, pepper, cumin, almonds & alum, contains 13 stones & a half & each stone contains 8 pounds for a total of 108 pounds in the hundred.

The informal public imperial measurement standards erected at the Royal Observatory , Greenwich , London , in the 19th century: 1 British yard, 2 feet , 1 foot , 6 inches , and 3 inches . The inexact monument was designed to permit rods of the correct measure to fit snugly into its pins at an ambient temperature of 62 °F (16 2 ⁄ 3 °C ). [ 1 ] [ 2 ]
Bronze Yard No.11, the official standard of length for the United States between 1855 and 1892, when the Treasury Department formally adopted a metric standard. Bronze Yard No.11 was forged to be an exact copy of the British Imperial Standard Yard, which was ruined in 1834 during the Burning of Parliament . Both were line standards: the yard was defined by the distance at 62 °F between two fine lines drawn on gold plugs (closeup, top) installed in recesses near each end of the bar.
A helium–neon laser at the Kastler-Brossel Laboratory at Pierre and Marie Curie University , Paris. Britain's metric and imperial units of length and volume are now all ultimately derived from measurements of the speed of light in vacuum .
Before the 2019 revision of the SI , Britain's units of mass were derived from national standards periodically reverified against the platinum and iridium international prototype of the kilogram stored beneath two bell jars in a basement vault at the International Bureau of Weights and Measures 's headquarters at Pavillon de Breteuil in Paris . A display replica shown at Paris's Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie is shown here. The modern kilogram is defined by a fundamental property of matter.