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Hi,
We have already banned imperial measures in a strict sense, as the SI or metric system is now the only legal system for trade in Australia. The relevant legislation allows for certain imperial units to be continued with where it is provided for by international treaty (nautical miles) or where the old units are so entrenched it would be against the public interest to try to change (degrees, minutes, and seconds; the metric unit of angular measure is the radian).
So in a strictly legal sense astro gear advertised for sale in Australia should indeed be described in metric terms only, but no-one is going to get prosecuted for not doing so unless they are gaining some sort of improper rip-off advantage that way. Many retailers will be using existing catalogue descriptions written and supplied from overseas, and it would cost them extra to rewrite and reprint it, and we would pay for that eventually.
It is interesting to note the the USA legalised a metric system of measure as early as 1866, and of course their currency is decidedly metric. In 1988 they passed a law making the metric system the "preferred" system in the US, but what they have not done there is to pass any further law restricting the use of imperial units, as Australia has done.
As for the UK they will go metric in time, they must eventually, but it will be painful with so much rich history in the home of imperial measure. They have given us after all:
acres, bushels, chains, chalders, chaldrons, cloves, crowns, drachms, drams, farthings, fathoms, feet, florins, foolscap, fortnights, furlongs, gallons, gills, grains, groats, guineas, hogsheads, hundredweights, lasts, leagues, luggs, miles, minims, nails, ounces, pecks, pence, pennyweights, pints, poles, perchs, pounds, quarts, quarters, rods, roods, sacks, scruples, stones, tods, tons, troy ounces, wire gauges, weys and yards
Cheers
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