I actually had a brilliant listen of an audiobook happening in Australia by a local author and all measurements were metric. It was such a thrill to listen to someone using metric in the English language.
I just tested it on a few colleagues in the warehouse where I work. I asked how wide the walkway in the warehouse was. I didn’t ask for cm or feet/inches but just how wide. All said “about 4 foot” whereas the answer is 120cm (which I have told them plenty of times for other reasons).
I must admit that I have to disagree. The little corner of the UK where I live is not inhabited by people who by and large are metric. It is inhabited by people who are imperial in their private life and more often than not are metric but will revert to imperial after work.
Anyway if the UK was metric - as you seem to claim (maybe apart from speed and beer) then we wouldn’t have this discussion. In Denmark where I come from we would never refer to pre-metric measurements (apart from a measuring stick is called a tommestok even though it measures on cm and not tommer.
That was the birth weight but since inches are longer than cm your reasoning surely suggests they would choose to ask for the measurements in cm.
the weight and height in metric but are asked to “translate” it to imperial measurements for the parents.
There is always the one, but I challenge you to try the same exercise. British - or at least the ones I meet - aren’t native metric. They can use metric - not that it is difficult - but it isn’t instinctive. My partner is a paediatric nurse and she says that when children are born they note
Well…. I normally ask people to demonstrate how metric they are by asking them for their height and weight and after 12 years in the UK I have still to come across anyone who instinctively answers in metric. Most don’t even know what their measurements are in metric.
Ermmm…… I do and I am at least 17 years off your mark. With that said, I was taught English in the 70’s in the UAE by English teachers still teaching pounds/shilling/pence and reminiscing about “the colonies”.
They did back Brexit, so why not?
The ERM2 process is not that rigid. The intention is that a country spends two years - or there about - with its currency pegged to the Euro within a band. It can be shorter or longer but irrespective of that it is supported by the ECB.
Countries only join once the rate is broadly in line with fundamentals, and they adjust before locking in.
If anything, that crisis is the reason the process is stricter now, not a reason it can’t work.
Black Wednesday isn’t really comparable. Back then the UK was trying to hold an unsustainable rate without the policy alignment or credibility needed to defend it. ERM II is explicitly designed to prevent a repeat of that.
If the UK credibly pegs to the euro beforehand, that clock can start regardless of how “important” the currency is globally.
Its less about reserve status, more about whether the peg is believable and maintained.
Being a major reserve currency might make gbp a bit more volatile during the transition, but that doesn’t actually change the rules. ERM II is basically a 2-year test of keeping the exchange rate within a band.
It cannot join the Euro on day 1, but it can tie the gbp to the euro beforehand so it can join the ERM2 on or around the day it joins. From then there is only about two years to go.
But if the UK wants opt-outs it isnt ready to join anyway.
When the discussion in the UK has moved past the Euro and Schengen then they might be ready’ish.
In other words not any time soon.
Wow. That’s cheap diesel.
Ill have a toast with jordbærmarmelade. If this isn’t a Brexit win I really don’t know ?!?
What’s striking about the UK Brexit debate isn’t just that it’s wrong, it’s that people often know it’s wrong but say it anyway.
Claims get debunked, conceded, then recycled because they’re useful. That’s not confusion. It’s a habit of dishonesty that passes for debate.
That’s because the internal market, especially for services, are only for member states. As an outsider there are 27 sets of rules - which was also known beforehand.
I think Sweden has the same nostalgia around their krona and the Danes for their krone.
The problem is that the treaties are very clear; EU countries have to use the Euro. The problem is that it must happen as soon as practicable possible with the country being part of ERM2 for two years and the countries decide for themselves when they are ready to join ERM2 and ultimately the Euro.
That’s odd considering no deal was known to be better than a bad deal. But I might just have misunderstood since English isn’t my first language
Wait what, not a fair outcome?!? It got the best possible outcome given its red lined.
Not only did the UK get the outcome that it negotiated but it got the only possible outcome given the red lines from May, Johnson, and recently confirmed by Starmer.
I really feel sad for all what has happened, but when the UK wanted to have a simple trade deal outside the internal market, customs union and the ECJ then it is as close as it can be.
Sorry, but I actually don’t understand the “lack of clarity”. In 2017 the EU presented a graphic (Brexit staircase) showing closeness to the EU and the associated friction (or lack of same) together with the UK red lines.
With UKGOV red lines it was obvious what would happen.
