Although I recognise the advantages of the UK style plug,it just seems too "clunky".
The fuse in the plug does die with age, & domestic appliances are unnecessarily replaced at extra expense,when it is just an "aged" fuse.
Although it does have issues,I prefer the Australian standard plug.
It is light, convenient,fulfils all the requirements of a 240v plug,except the standard orientation is reversed
to what would be logical--earth pin is at the bottom instead of the top.
The standard cable outlet on an Australian plug is at the rear of the plug (in line with the pins).
The standard material is heavy duty flexible PVC.
It is just as easy to hurt bare feet with an Aussie plug as with a UK one, though,in fact the pins are sharper!!
Have you ever had a play with a US 240v 20A plug?
They are incredibly over-engineered!
In the USA,the 240v supply is from a centre-tapped pole transformer with both sides being "hot" w.r.t neutral
(& earth),hence ,you find equipment with fuses in both sides.I think this is actually illegal in Australia,but equipment wired this way is common among USA & Canadian sourced equipment.
I bought a shortwave radio many years ago, which was equipped with a 2 wire power cord.
This was a 240 volt device, but was designed for the US system.
It had an RF filter circuit on the AC mains input,with capacitors from both legs to the chassis,which in the USA
would be a "virtual earth".
In Australia,the chassis was tapped halfway down a capacitive voltage divider,so when ,in my eagerness,I attached an aerial & earth,the earth lead went "zap"!
Not enough current to do any harm to a person,but if I had attached any other equipment,it might not have
survived its first introduction to the new radio!
Needless to say, the first "mod" was a three core power cable!
VK6ZGO