Obviously someone did because "after years of wrangling between London and Brussels" they decided to scrap the scheme. I agree with what you are saying about the actual man on the market stall though - it was the council workers being jobsworths.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6988521.stm
As a side issue, why are we using the imperial system anyway? I thought my parents generation were meant to be the last ones that had to learn two systems? The metric system is much simpler to use.