In for a pound

By MARTIN DELGADO, Mail on Sunday

08:54am 29th August 2004

Jubilant traders have discovered a legal loophole which could scupper Government plans to abolish the imperial system of weights and measures.
Shops around the country are now preparing to put themselves beyond the reach of the law by turning themselves into private clubs.

The clubs ask shoppers to make a nominal donation to join and are then able to sell in pounds and ounces, apparently without breaking the law.

Enforcement officers have visited at least one store operating in this way but have taken no action against it.

The rebels could make it impossible for Ministers to meet their target of falling into line with European regulations by totally abolishing imperial measures in shops before the end of 2009.

One of the rebels, Peter Halstead, runs a fishmonger's in the Hertfordshire village of Codicote.

"It's right for Britain and my customers"

He explained yesterday how the system works: "If someone new comes in, we explain we are selling only in pounds and ounces and that, if they want to be served, they have to join our Imperial Club.

"They have to put 1p in a charity box - which gives them life membership - and write their names and addresses in a book. They are then given a registration number - normally the last three digits of their telephone number - which they quote each time they make a purchase."

The shop already has more than 1,000 loyal 'members' on its roll, with customers coming from miles around to support its stance.

Mr Halstead, 54, said enforcement officers had visited his store and quizzed him about his club but had not taken any action against him.

He has run Gemini Fish Supplies for 16 years and told yesterday how he converted to metric when the law originally changed - but switched back after just three months.

He said: "Many of our customers are quite elderly and we realised more than half of them didn't understand the new system.

"It was wrong to ban imperial measures at a stroke and alienate so much of the population.

"How can you appreciate the intrinsic value of what you're buying unless you understand the system by which the goods are weighed and measured?"

Mr Halstead said some customers were taken aback when he asked them to join the Imperial Club.

He said: "They think we're doing it for a laugh. But when we explain it to them, they always join. The only exception was a chap last week who was an ardent pro-European. He said we were fundamentalists and accused us of refusing to serve him, which wasn't true.

"When the inspectors came we told them about the club and they wrote it all down but we've heard nothing. Unless someone tells us it's illegal, we're going to carry on. I am taking a stand because I believe it's the right thing to do for Britain and for my customers.'

Metric Association chairman Robin Paice said last night: "It is essential to consumer protection that everybody understands and uses the same system of weights and measures.

"This possible loophole in the law only adds to the existing confusion and mess of British weights and measures."

But Neil Herron, of the Metric Martyrs Defence Fund, said he would encourage supporters to follow Mr Halstead's example.

"This could spread around the country. It would be a fantastic legal challenge if they tried to prosecute private members' clubs," he said.

This story first appeared in . For more great stories, buy this week's Mail on Sunday. Discuss: Do you want to keep imperial measures?


_____________
COMMENT:

re: "They think we're doing it for a laugh. But when we explain it to them, they always join. The only exception was a chap last week who was an ardent pro-European. He said we were fundamentalists"

REPLY: 'He who verbally abuses others holds up a mirror to himself' - TB

Tone

Interesting argument, but unfortunately fundamentally flawed.

My understanding is:

A "private member's club" takes any surplus, and either distributes it amongst the members, or puts it toward furthering the objectives of the club.

An example would be my old rugby club, who put the bar profits toward furthering our ambition to play at higher & higher levels. The technicality that avoids compliance with the weights & measures act is that we are buying part of our own property (which we owned as members) and it is therefore not a retail sale. The club was therefore at liberty to use unstamped pint glasses & optics to deliver beer/whisky.

I am aware of one cricket club that considered whether to fully metricate their bar in the '70's (if the members decided to do so)

Various "snooker clubs" were set up in Scotland during the '80's. Only members were allowed into the clubs. The profits went into the owner's pockets. These clubs claimed to be exempt from the WMA. When it was pointed out to the owners that this meant some sort of profit sharing with the members, they changed their tune very quickly.

So, IMHO, unless the shopkeeper referred to in your post is an employee of the "club", and paid a salary determined by the committee of the "club", and the profits are used for the furtherence of the objectives of the "club", or distributed to the members, his sales are by retail, and therefore subject to the WMA '85

What do you think?

"It was wrong to ban imperial measures at a stroke"

That quote really made me laugh.

re (Beranger): So, IMHO, unless the shopkeeper referred to in your post is an employee of the "club", and paid a salary determined by the committee of the "club", and the profits are used for the furtherence of the objectives of the "club", or distributed to the members, his sales are by retail, and therefore subject to the WMA '85. What do you think?

REPLY: I've be a member of the club for just over 2 years and am quite happy with the way the 'club' is run. I'm not sure that a 'club' needs many rules, but if this club needs a set of rules to defeat the Units of Measurements Regulations 1994, I'm sure it could be done. A one-page of foolscap constitution, an annual meeting, and a decision to appoint the current shopkeepers as employees should do it. The annual meeting could take no longer than 5 minutes, we could then buy our wet fish and have a quick drink in Codicote before driving home to put the fish in the freezer.

One of the best-run 'clubs' I ever belonged to was the Harlow Playhouse Film Club. AGMs would typically run from 8pm to 8.05pm once a year and then it was on with the evening's, er, footage

If the "club" went bankrupt, who could be called on to make good the losses. The creditors might argue in court that the "club" was in reality a partnership and that the members as co-partners would have to dig into their own pockets to make good the losses.

Ltd companies own clubs.

Ltd compaines have Ltd liabilites

Here's some case law to mull over:-

From O'Keefe's "The law of Weights & Measures"

<<Sales in clubs

The supply of goods to members by a private members’ club is not a sale for the purposes of this Act but a sale to non-members, even if unauthorised, is such a sale. In Graff v Evans (1882) 8 QBD 373 at 378 (cf Newman v Jones (1886) 17 QBD 132) it was held that where intoxicating liquor, which is bona fide the property of a club, is supplied to a member of the club who pays for it, the transaction, though resembling a sale, is not a sale within the meaning of the Licensing Acts. In substance, the member is consuming his own property, and the mode of payment is a matter of internal arrangement regulated by the rules of the club. On the other hand, a member of a proprietary club may, in similar circumstances, be a party to a contract of sale; see Baird v Wells (1890) 44 Ch D 661.>>

From Butterworths "Trading & Consumer Law"

<<(2) Gaff v Evans (1882) 8 QBD 373

This decision explained the ‘domestic’ nature of members’ clubs, any ‘profit’ on the supply of liquor by the club to a member in fact being a surplus belonging to the members themselves. (In the case of such unincorporated associations, in law the assets of the club are already owned by the members and any ‘profit’ made in the supply of liquor etc is normally not taxable for similar reasons, the so called ‘principle of mutuality’.)

See also Cahalne v London Borough Council (1985) 149 JP 561, QBD, where a purported ‘video club’ was held not to be a ‘club’ in the above sense. Per curiam:

‘If the only evidence of a club was, as it seems to have been, these advertisement pamphlets and that the trading standards officer had completed what was termed a membership card, it seems to me that that would not be sufficient to raise any presumption that this was a club. On the face of it ... it was a colourable device to call it a club. There was no evidence that any committee was involved or that there were any rules or that there was any procedure for joining. All that was being done in terms was to hand over to somebody who came in from the street, prepared to pay the necessary fee, the video cassette they wished to take away on hire.’>>