Jacques Bouillon, president of the General Conference on Weights and Measures, today announced the introduction of a new SI unit describing the degree of loathsomeness displayed by an individual or organisation. The new unit is the "savile" and is logarithmically scaled from 1 to 10. Some early ratings include Piers Morgan (8.3 saviles), Ed Balls (4.6), John Terry (5.1) and Adolf Hitler (4.9). Negative ratings are also calculated, with Kate Middleton rated at -7.3 saviles, Clare Balding at -6.8 and Stephen Fry at -0.3.
M Bouillon (1.4) was unable to enlighten journalists (6.2) at the press conference as to the source of the new unit's name but further details should emerge when the EU (4.7) debates the introduction of the savile next month.
