IT is the moment most parents dread. Last night, my ten-year-old uttered those spine-chilling words: "Mum, I need help with my maths homework."

He was working out fractions of litres, kilograms and metres in millilitres, grams and centimetres. Thankfully, with everything dividing neatly into 1000ths and 100ths, even I was able to work out the answers.

"Count yourself lucky you don't work in pounds and ounces like I did," I said. He looked at me blankly: "We've never done those." He doesn't know what farthings, florins, guineas or crowns are either. And why should he? Most of the world is now metric. We have moved on.

Sunderland's so-called Metric Martyr Steven Thoburn, who lost a legal challenge in the High Court this week over the right not to use metric measures, doesn't seem to have noticed.

I can understand why he still wants to price goods in pounds and ounces for his older customers. There is nothing to stop him doing that. The law simply says he should price things in metric as well. And, given that metric measurement has been taught at school for nearly 30 years, it makes good business sense as well.

The court battle has, so far, cost more than £100,000. An appeal to the House of Lords will cost even more. Mr Thoburn and four other traders, who are prepared to go to jail for the right to sell goods exclusively in pounds and ounces, say the latest legal decision marks "the death of democracy" and is about who really governs Britain.

What a load of tosh. Some principles are worth fighting for. This isn't one of them. These petty, so-called martyrs are so deluded they claim their human rights are being abused.

This may seem a minor point to Mr Thoburn, but is it really fair to teach our children one set of measurements and then have totally different ones in the shops? We parents find maths homework hard enough without adding to the confusion.

THE death of eight-year-old Victoria Climbie, tortured over many months by her great-aunt and boyfriend, while a succession of social workers, police officers and doctors failed to spot what was happening, puts us all to shame. Her parents, who are planning to sue Haringey Council, are demanding the professionals involved share the blame. But shouldn't they, as parents, also accept some responsibility? They sent their child off from the Ivory Coast to live with a distant relative they knew little about so she could be educated in England. Didn't they have a duty to choose a suitable guardian for their vulnerable, French-speaking child before they packed her off to live in a foreign land?

DANGEROUS roads across our region have been named and shamed as some of the worst in Europe. And I thought accidents were caused by dangerous drivers.

A NEW car shrinks by 2ft (or 60cm for those of you who never did feet and inches at school) lengthways to make parking easier. But what we really need is a car that shrinks widthways. Then we might be able to park in between cars and open the doors so that we can get the children out.

AGEING rocker Rod Stewart scrawled "I love my Penny - Rod" on his girlfriend's arm on a recent night out. About as romantic as a farmer using a branding iron on his prize bull or cow.

Published: Friday, February 22, 2002