It is all about control

The Telegraph report that:

"A man who sells leftover vegetables from his garden to passers-by has been ordered to comply with European rules on weights and measures.

The Northumberland landowner, who leaves baskets of surplus vegetables at the end of his driveway, was amazed to receive a warning from trading standards officials after they spotted an honesty box next to his stall.

They ordered James Cookson, who says he takes between £5 and £10 a week selling vegetables that would otherwise have gone to waste, to meet European Union requirements governing the sale of fresh foods.

Officials from Northumberland County Council told him the parsnips, spinach and leeks grown in his walled garden should be sold by metric weight, following EU rules, and sent him four pages of guidance.

...

He said: "We sold five parsnips from the stall last week and there was £1 in the honesty box. The letter is laughable. I have not got a clue about why the trading standards department has got involved, unless someone has reported us.

"They appear to be saying we should be selling parsnips by the kilo rather than just pricing them individually. I have got better things to kick up a fuss about, but it just tickles my sense of humour that someone has bothered to write an official letter about something like this," Mr Cookson added."

That's what you get when you spend 11+ years expanding the public sector and creating thousands and thousands of regulatory jobs. These people have to justify their roles and if that means enforcing to the letter any number of ridiculous laws, then they are only doing their jobs. "Only doing their jobs", now where have I heard that phrase before?