It has nothing to do with not invented here, a lot of flights in UK and europe are over relatively short distances (for americans) and at relatively low levels. Now look at the altimeter setting region map for the UK, it would make things worse not better to have 180 as the changeover, 60 as a blanket level would be more sensible, if that is required.
In a discussion with NATS team about level busts only last week 3 of the 7 most serious incidents involved people being cleared to a flight level and not setting standard straight away but waiting until they passed Trans Alt then forgetting to set standard bingo, level bust! Their message, which is what I have always been taught/taught is that when cleared to a level, set standard, and when cleared to an alt set the qnh. The sop in my company is to set standard on the 2 primary alts and leave qnh on the standby until the 10 checks/climb checks.