The metric martyr lives on
WORKERS, APRIL 2004 ISSUE
At the untimely age of 39, Steve Thoburn, Britain's most famous greengrocer, has died. Together with Neil Herron, a fishmonger also from Sunderland, he became known as a Metric Martyr after standing up for customers' rights to buy their fruit, vegetables and fish in pounds and ounces if they so wished after EU regulations only permitted produce to be sold in kilograms.
Exposed
Steve was charged and prosecuted under the Metric Regulations for selling a pound of bananas. What was exposed in the court case and subsequent appeals highlighted the fact that laws made in Brussels now had supremacy over British law. His case was rejected by the European Court of Human Rights a few weeks ago, but Steve vowed to continue the fight, declaring we may not beat the government but we will win in the court of the people.
An unlikely hero, Steve became well known locally, nationally and internationally because of his conviction. He was joined by other traders from London, Cornwall and Surrey to fight the EU Regulations. The campaign was funded entirely by the public. The British Weights and Measures Association paid tribute to Steve saying Steve Thoburn is indeed a martyr and should be recognised as a national hero. It is damnable that he dies a criminal owing to these totalitarian regulations.
Spirit
His spirit of resistance lives on in Neil Herron, the Sunderland fishmonger, who joined his campaign following the seizure of three sets of scales by police officers and Trading Standards Officers in July 2000. They went on to create Metric Martyrs, Steve was voted Man of the Year in an ITV poll and the two won European Campaigners of the Year Award in 2002.
How appropriate then that Neil Herron should now be fronting up the NO Campaign against the Northern Regional Assembly or Euro Region. Both issues relate to the whole question of the EU dictating British law and constitutional affairs. The campaign has got off to a flying start, and has exposed a conspiracy between local government and UNISON officials to create a YES campaign, both acting outside their electors' mandate.
Local authorities in the north had already set up an unelected Northern Regional Assembly with the arrogance of assuming there would be no opposition to it. Its role would be to campaign for the real thing and carve up the plum jobs that may be available. But Herron proved that the local authorities were acting ultra vires in spending public money on the body. They therefore registered it as a private company to limit the liability of those spending this money.
Herron then questioned the fact that the new company and the Campaign for English Regions, set up nationally for the YES campaign, both had their registered address at UNISON's Regional Office in Newcastle. He also questioned why UNISON was giving money to the CFER which was then passed on to the new company of which the UNISON Regional Secretary was a Director and Company Secretary. She was also Vice Chair of the unelected Northern Regional Assembly but has since quietly resigned.
Funding
The YES campaign had tried to register with Companies House, two names for their formal campaign organisation, which would claim government funding to campaign for a yes vote in the coming referendum in October 2004. However, when they tried, they discovered that Herron had already registered two identical names and they therefore could not use them.
Herron continues to run what he calls a Peoples' Campaign against the Euro Region, much to the annoyance of the Tory party who feel left out and desperately want to organise what they call a campaign based on local business. Perhaps if they had started by selling bananas in pounds and ounces like Steve Thoburn, they might have earned the respect that the NO campaign now has in the region.