Just to confirm that at the turn of 2003/4, the total number of metric distances or heights/widths in the United Kingdom known to have been converted to imperial (or simply removed) stood at 2,096. This includes those amended or removed by Councils, not just those amended or removed by supporters of ARM or indeed others.

A handy donation of a 'quarter of a mile' of funds from an ARM member from Lewisham has boosted our stocks of white and black lettering for those illegal metric signs that Councils refuse to amend.

Our donor usually sends a 'furlong' of pounds (i.e. £220) but after ARM supporters helped him to convert a few signs in his 'back yard' in Brockley, Lewisham, he came in with a generous donation of a quarter of a mile of pounds (i.e. £440).

ARM would like to thank all its donors and spotters and we look forward to continuing to counter the 'imperial obliteration' policy of the European Union with a spot or two of obliteration of our own.

We like to refer to this process as our 'piece by piece process' and hereby state our ongoing commitment to that process, despite hardline [European] Unionist objections to it.

In case anyone objects to our obliterations, please note again that under Section 131 (2) of the Highways Act 1980, obliteration [sic] of signs 'illegally placed on the highway' is legally permitted.

The first projected 'raid' by ARM supporters in 2004 is to be on a series of illegal metric-only width signs in Cambridgeshire. The County Council has been warned but has failed to act.

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Happy New Year from us all at the Council of Active Resistance to Metrication

<<
In case anyone objects to our obliterations, please note again that under Section 131 (2) of the Highways Act 1980, obliteration [sic] of signs 'illegally placed on the highway' is legally permitted.
>>

Not proven.

English law diustinguishes between "Illegal" and "unlawful". If a council placed a speed restriction sign whose red rim was 1mm too narrow, I believe that the sign would be unlawful, but not illegal.

ARM should be careful when they use the word "illegal" - they might be sued for libel!

re (Martin): "English law distinguishes between "illegal" and "unlawful". If a Council placed a speed restriction sign whose red rim was 1mm too narrow, I believe that the sign would be unlawful, but not illegal.

"ARM should be careful when they use the word "illegal" - they might be sued for libel!"

REPLY:

With all due respect, Martin, English law knows no distinction between the words 'illegal' and 'unlawful'.

There *is*, of course, a distinction between unlawful / illegal behaviour which is criminal and that which is not criminal.

So, for example, committing murder is unlawful and criminal.

Erecting an illegal metric road signs is unlawful / illegal but not criminal.

ARM has never accused local authorities of criminal behaviour but we have - and will - accuse them of unlawful behaviour.

Libel means the written publication of inaccurate information or opinion about a person or body which tends to lower their reputation

Tony Bennett wrote

<<
ARM has never accused local authorities of criminal behaviour but we have - and will - accuse them of unlawful behaviour.
>>

Indeed you might (unless of course they have received a dispansation from the Minister which he is able to do without recourse to Parliament). The Act however only applies to *illegal* signs that hyave been illegally erected, not unlawfully erected.

re (Martin): "The Act however only applies to *illegal* signs that have been illegally erected, not unlawfully erected".

REPLY:

The words used in the 1980 Act, Section 131 (2), are: "...unlawfully placed on the highway".

A metric-only distance or height / width sign is 'unlawfully placed on the highway'.

A person seeing such a sign is legally entitled to do one of two things - again using the words of the Act:

(A) pull it down

or

(B) obliterate it

This does not mean the sign can be stolen or damaged.

re: "This does not mean the sign can be stolen or damaged".

REPLY:

I agree that any sign may not be 'stolen'. It remains the property of the Highways Authority which erected it. It is ARM's policy to offer (in writing) the return of any removed sign to the authority concerned. On the very rare occasions when the authority requests the return of its property, the sign has been returned by ARM or its supporters although with the illegal 'm' removed.

As for 'damaged', the Act entitles one to 'obliterate' signs 'unlawfully placed on the highway'. That is not 'damage' in law, it is the *lawful* obliteration of an unlawful sign and no more than that

ARM activists have been known to 'ammend' signs in such a way that the result is no more 'lawfully placed' than the original.

Re: "As for 'damaged', the Act entitles one to 'obliterate' signs 'unlawfully placed on the highway'. That is not 'damage' in law, it is the *lawful* obliteration of an unlawful sign and no more than that"

Then why is it that in your own appeal court case the charge of criminal damage was upheld.

re (mega Mickey): "Then why is it that in your own appeal court case the charge of criminal damage was upheld?"

REPLY:

A fair question.

The answer is that when the sign which said '600 metres' (illegal) on it was over-labelled with one saying '600 yards (legal), it was found that a few drips of black paint had dribbled below the area covered by the new label '600 yds'.

Had that not been the case, the verdict would have been 'Not Guilty' instead of 'Guilty' with an absolute discharge.

The Judge and two Magistrates did not on that occasion accept that the Highways Act 1980 entitled one to do anything beyond covering over the illegal measurement and, if appropriate, converting it with a legal one.

The barrister I instructed was not willing to appeal the conviction on the Highways Act point. It would have meant a very expensive appeal to the Court of Appeal merely to substitute a 'Not Guilty' verdict for an Absolute Discharge. He was unwilling to recommend that Legal Aid be granted for this purpose and I had to accept that.

He nevertheless also advised me that the Highways Act 1980 defence would prove a useful defence in any future broadly similar case

Which means that the 1980 Higways act defence has not been successfully applied. The claim that ARM are legally immune from prosecution is dubious.

It's up to you Tony, but I'd be very wary of inciting others to act in a potentially unlawful way on the pretext that they are legally empowered to do so.