Great Britain (the title of England, Wales and Scotland in use since 1474) is getting to the end of its credible life. It is, indeed, true that in world terms Britain was great and had the largest empire ever (in terms of land area). Once upon a time it was true that “The sun never sets on the British Empire,” because the empire consisted of colonies all over the world. After World War II, British imperialism began to wane as the United Kingdom granted independence to most of its colonial possessions.
Britain's wealth and place in the world came as a result of its power and the fact that it subjugated or conquered so much of the world. Britain was great and few could deny that. During the last 70 years we have still been amongst the countries in the world with a major say in, and influence on, world affairs.
However reality has now to be faced and whilst Britain leads the world in many areas it is no longer an imperial player and it has to accept that size matters. The USA and Chinese blocs may fight it out and the economic might of the European Economic Community will be a massive player but Britain, despite its residual economic power and its armed forces and, of course, being a nuclear power, is no longer the great power that it once was. At present we are in danger of becoming irrelevant and, worse still a laughing stock.
Why? Well, amongst many other reasons, we withdrew from the EC. So we think we can do as we please but have no clout against a bloc of such powerful nations. We are no longer of any use to the US as an insider in Europe. I should not be surprised if The Commonwealth slowly (possibly speedily) ceases to exist as we become less and less relevant to the individual countries involved. Indeed when Queen Elizabeth ceases to be monarch a huge emotional Commonwealth loyalty will disappear.
However, whilst all these mighty issues march on, Great Britain is free to reconsider its use of the Metric System and revert to the post 1826 Imperial weights and measures (previously or otherwise known as the English System).
It is this latter possible debate that brings me to consider whether there is any chance that there might be any situation where our Government and Downing Street in particular considers the return of the scruple.
NOTE. For those unaware of Britain's former weights and measures a 'scruple' was a small amount of something equivalent to 20 grains used in the system of apothecaries' weight used by pharmacists. In plain English a 'scruple' is a sense of right and wrong that keeps a person from doing something bad or a feeling of guilt from doing something bad.
