GMT v BST

[Paul_C]

Just deal with domestic issues for the first hour until the Continentals are opening their doors for the day.

T'is the other way round, they've been open for one hour before us.

Oops! I meant that the Continentals can take care of their business for the first hour before dealing with Britain, of course. But the previous statement stands: If, say, a large number of European businesses with which somebody here wants to deal open for business at 9 a.m. CE(S)T and our hypothetical British business really considers that extra hour an essential, why not just open at 8 a.m. British time?

But it would make sense to adjust to suit the majority, not maintain the status quo to suit the minority.
http://wwp.britishsummertime.co.uk/poll/central-european-time.htm[/QUOTE]
Is it a majority? So far that poll represents the views of fewer than 10,000 votes, and then we have no idea how many of the votes have come from people outside the U.K, or how many are multiple votes. I don't really think that's anywhere near conclusive evidence that the majority of people in the U.K. would support the change.

There have been a number of studies into the impact of SDST on road safety and estimates have been debated. The most recent and in-depth study was commissioned by the Government in 1998 to resolve the arguments about the likely impact of SDST. The study found that overall: {.....}

I have a deep-seated distrust for surveys which produce only estimates of things like this, since it often turns out that the reality is much different. It would be interesting to see a detailed analysis, however.

The Canaries are only in Europe because of their political affilliation with Spain. I suspect if it were not for that affilliation they would not be classed as in Europe. Iceland and The Faroes are considerably further north so a different time zone would be understandable.

Parts of Scotland are also a good way north compared to much of Europe, so surely there's just as much an argument for Scotland? (Especially considering the aspect mentioned earlier, i.e. that it would result in sunrise being around 10 a.m. and sunset not until 11:30 p.m. in some parts of Scotland at different times of the year.) Or, conversely, if the U.K. & Ireland being an hour behind most of western Europe is such a barrier to trade (which I don't believe it is), then surely the same argument would apply to those more far-flung places?

I'm not convinced of the accuracy of your statement. According to Wikipedia, the majority of European contries adopted CET before or around the time of the First World War, but it was only in the 60's, 70's and 80's that they adopted CEST.

I'd have to look up the details to be certain, but I know that France and Germany certainly started adjusting the clocks for summertime around the time of WWI.

 

[RedHerring2]

OK, so allowing for yours and other's sceptism, if there was a marginal benefit in business, crime reduction, health and lifestyle, and most importantly, some reduction in fatalities and serious injuries, isn't it worth pursuing an experiment to identify and quantify the benefits and disadvantages?

 

[ABCwarrior]

Good informative posts folks. I was hoping that by keeping the clocks on BST all the time(not moving them again forward to BST+1) I could just sit in the howff drinking tea til 10am until it was safe to go outside and work and be away at 4pm, but as I've said they'd just move my working day!!!

 

[ban-all-sheds]

it seems to me that adopting a time which means that in the middle of December the sun doesn't rise over Inverness until 10 a.m. is ridiculous.

Will that be the Inverness in Scotland which is further south than the southernmost point of Norway, a country which is in the CET zone?

I wonder how they manage to survive there, I really do. Presumably they don't have a modern civilisation, no schools, no jobs, no telephone links with the rest of the world.

I would suggest that we should simply scrap BST and use GMT year round.

I'm sure you would, but you are barking mad.

... EU-stipulated start and end dates ...

... arguments almost always come from the pro-EU camp ...

There really is no limit to your pathetic, cowering, frightened, stupid xenophobia, is there.

How about an argument which comes from looking at the latitude and longitude extents of this map and seeing that maybe there's simply something not right?

 

[htgeng]

it seems to me that adopting a time which means that in the middle of December the sun doesn't rise over Inverness until 10 a.m. is ridiculous.

Will that be the Inverness in Scotland which is further south than the southernmost point of Norway, a country which is in the CET zone?

I agree. If you believe SNP then the trial will cause chaos to Scotland. Yet they ignore the tourist benefits to them. They ignore the Scottish Farmers who have said they are ok with the trial. They ignore Scottish RoSPA who say the trial would save people being needlessly killed on the roads.

But then they were voted in and hold a veto over the British population. Thats democracy for you!

 

[Paul_C]

Will that be the Inverness in Scotland which is further south than the southernmost point of Norway, a country which is in the CET zone?

Yes. And it's also the Inverness which lies over 9 degrees west of the western coast of Norway, and almost 15 degrees west of Oslo. Longitude plays a part as well as latitude.

I'm sure you would, but you are barking mad.

Why? GMT is the natural time for the U.K. based upon its location (assuming that we are sticking to time zones based on one-hour increments for each 15 degrees of longitude, and aren't going to revert to local times which would vary from place to place across the country as in the early part of the 19th century).

There really is no limit to your pathetic, cowering, frightened, stupid xenophobia, is there.

Give it a rest. Being against EU interference and attempts to try and "harmonize" everything across Europe does not mean that anyone is xenophobic.

How about an argument which comes from looking at the latitude and longitude extents of this map and seeing that maybe there's simply something not right?

O.K. then, let's do that. What is it that you think is not right?

 

[RedHerring2]

Using the map as a reference, I'm not sure that the northerly geographical position is a fair argument for or against time zones. The fact is that the further north you are the shorter the daylight is. That's fact.

It is really only the westerly geographical position that should determine the appropriate time zone. thus Scotland has no places more westerly than say Cornwall. They have shorter daylight hours, simples.
Ireland, perhaps has a greater argument than Scotland, even though parts of Spain are further west than Ireland.
The Canaries are considerably further west than Ireland.

BTW, to be fair, the previous suggestion in English Parliament (circa 1995/98 ) to try an experiment was voted down by MPs, despite a majority of people/organisations being for it.

Ireland considered a change. I haven't discovered a great deal of information about that.

Jersey held a referendum and voted against a change, despite being further south than UK.

So, all-in-all, it seems, despite a majority supporting a change, previous evidence and studies/reports of expected benefits indicating some benefits, people/MPs still vote against it.
This, alone, should indicate that the decision is an emotive issue, not something based on hard evidence.

 

[Paul_C]

Using the map as a reference, I'm not sure that the northerly geographical position is a fair argument for or against time zones.

Agreed. As you say, it's a simple fact that the further north we go (in the northern hemisphere), the fewer hours of daylight we get in winter, and no meddling with the clocks can change that physical fact. Norway is a good example since we can look at the situation in extreme northerly latitudes, but ignoring any issues about advancing the clocks in summer or not, the bulk of Norway does lie within the "proper" time zone for its location (the farthest western parts such as Bergen actually fall within the natural boundary of the GMT zone).

To quote from yesterday, the "something not right" in the map above is the adoption of the GMT+1 zone by countries which lie well to the west of its natural boundary. The 7.5 deg. E line runs roughly from the Dutch/German border down to somewhere around the French/Italian border, which means that France & Spain are clearly well outside the time zone they've adopted, as are Belgium, Luxembourg, and The Netherlands, to a lesser extent.

Ireland considered a change. I haven't discovered a great deal of information about that.

I can't find too much about it with a quick search, except for this piece from the Irish Times:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/weekend/2011/0326/1224293121730.html

Moving forward a time zone there would put the far western parts well outside their natural time zone, given that they are already beyond the natural 7.5 deg. W limits of the GMT zone. In Galway, for example, sunrise on December 21st is already not until around 8:50 a.m., which would be 9:50 a.m. with the proposed change. And as with parts of Scotland, if Ireland still "sprang forward" an hour during summer, sunset in Galway on June 21st would be well after 11 p.m.

 

[RedHerring2]

The 7.5 deg. E line runs roughly from the Dutch/German border down to somewhere around the French/Italian border, which means that France & Spain are clearly well outside the time zone they've adopted, as are Belgium, Luxembourg, and The Netherlands, to a lesser extent.

I know, from first hand experience, that Bretons are happy with their status quo and that harvesting goes on untill midnight, by headlights.
France also is a larger country and its eastern borders need CET. It makes sense for France to have a harmonious time zone.

I can't find too much about it with a quick search, except for this piece from the Irish Times:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/weekend/2011/0326/1224293121730.html

I was referring to an earlier consideration:
http://www.timeanddate.com/news/time/ireland-considers-cet.html

In Galway, for example, sunrise on December 21st is already not until around 8:50 a.m., which would be 9:50 a.m. with the proposed change. And as with parts of Scotland, if Ireland still "sprang forward" an hour during summer, sunset in Galway on June 21st would be well after 11 p.m.

Going from my Three Peaks experience, It is still light in Fort William until after 2300hrs on 21st June. We'd start Ben Nevis around 1830hrs, back down by about 2200hrs, wash & change, tea and still catch the Fish & Chip shop in Fort William, while it was still daylight, before departing for Sca Fell Pike overnight.
If Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland decided to remain on BST/GMT, you've already elegantly explained that time zones are no barrier to efficient business trading.
Lets decide what's best for England, not allow Scotland or Northern Ireland to wield a veto.
They have an option to do their own thing, if they want.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Yes. And it's also the Inverness which lies over 9 degrees west of the western coast of Norway, and almost 15 degrees west of Oslo. Longitude plays a part as well as latitude.

OK.

Will that be the Inverness which is 5 degrees east of Cape Finisterre?

Why? GMT is the natural time for the U.K. based upon its location

Indeed, but the question is either at what completely arbitrary positions of two pointers on a dial do we want to have our daylight or what completely arbitrary number do we wish to assign to the time when the Sun is at its highest relative to us.

Give it a rest. Being against EU interference and attempts to try and "harmonize" everything across Europe does not mean that anyone is xenophobic.

And there we have it again.

Me give it a rest?

Outside of those to do with criminal behaviour I doubt that there's a single law or regulation which you do not regard as either a government attack on your personal liberties or an attempt by a European cabal to subjugate the UK into a United States of Europe, or both, and you never miss an opportunity to bang on about it.

O.K. then, let's do that. What is it that you think is not right?

That we are in a different time zone to Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark (mainland), France, Germany, Gibraltar, Hungary, Italy, Kosovo, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Vatican City.

 

[Paul_C]

Will that be the Inverness which is 5 degrees east of Cape Finisterre?

Yes. And the same Inverness which is still 4 degrees or so west of the Greenwich meridian. Cape Finisterre's natural time zone from its location over 9 deg. W would actually be GMT-1 hr. (not that I'm suggesting it would be sensible for local time there to be set at GMT-1 when it's only by a small amount and the rest of the country naturally falls within the GMT time zone).

O.K. then, let's do that. What is it that you think is not right?

That we are in a different time zone to Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark (mainland), France, Germany, Gibraltar, Hungary, Italy, Kosovo, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Vatican City.

Why do you think that is not right? We're in a different time zone from dozens of other countries too.

France also is a larger country and its eastern borders need CET. It makes sense for France to have a harmonious time zone.

I'm not disputing that it makes sense for a country compact enough (in the east-to-west direction) to adopt a single time zone, just as we did with GMT in Britain when the railways effectively forced the issue.

I just went in search of some of the particular history of daylight saving adoption and time zones in France, as I knew that the country adopted Paris time (about 9 minutes ahead of GMT) in the late 19th century before formally switching to GMT later, but didn't know the history of how it went from that to the present situation.

A post here seems to contain a fairly thorough coverage of the development:
http://www.webastro.net/forum/showthread.php?t=54557

So to summarize, at the beginning of the 20th century France was on GMT, then adopted summer time of GMT+1 in 1916. WWII resulted in forced adoption of the equivalent of CET/CEST during the German occupation, then at the end of war France abandoned clock changes and remained on GMT+1 year round. Daylight savings with GMT+2 during the summer months was then introduced in 1976, citing energy saving issues etc. following the fuel crisis.

I don't know how those changes fit in with France's neighboring countries over the same period, but it's a varied and interesting history.

If Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland decided to remain on BST/GMT, you've already elegantly explained that time zones are no barrier to efficient business trading.
Lets decide what's best for England, not allow Scotland or Northern Ireland to wield a veto.
They have an option to do their own thing, if they want.

Certainly. The point I was making earlier is just that if an hour's difference between England and France is supposedly a problem for trade, then creating a similar hour's difference between England & Scotland or between England and any part of Ireland must surely be a similar problem.

I wonder if there were ever any suggestions in the post-war period up until 1976 that there were any tangible seasonal differences in the difficulties of Anglo-French trade when we were on the same time during the summer but an hour behind during winter? Or, along similar lines, whether any tangible benefits could be measured during the 1968-1971 experiment when we were on the same time for over 3 years straight?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

... when it's only by a small amount and the rest of the country naturally falls within the GMT time zone).

But it's in the CE zone, GMT +1

Why do you think that is not right? We're in a different time zone from dozens of other countries too.

Look at the map again.

If we are right then there are an awful lot of people who are wrong -look how much red there is.

OTOH, if they are right then we should be red too. The map shows that the Central European time zone extends further north than us, further south than us, further west than us and further east than us.

 

[RedHerring2]

So to summarize, at the beginning of the 20th century France was on GMT, then adopted summer time of GMT+1 in 1916. WWII resulted in forced adoption of the equivalent of CET/CEST during the German occupation, then at the end of war France abandoned clock changes and remained on GMT+1 year round. Daylight savings with GMT+2 during the summer months was then introduced in 1976, citing energy saving issues etc. following the fuel crisis.

This is a similar pattern to most European countries, which seems to suggest that an energy saving motive is sufficient for the adoption of CET/CEST.

Certainly. The point I was making earlier is just that if an hour's difference between England and France is supposedly a problem for trade, then creating a similar hour's difference between England & Scotland or between England and any part of Ireland must surely be a similar problem.

OK, so assuming that we are both using the trade difficulties, or not, when we prefer to support or deny the adoption of CET. Lets look at the amount of trade: UK/Europe compared to England/Ireland, NI, Scotland.

Obviously, it's not the physical movement of goods that matter but the commercial/financial communication that is important.
I would suggest that the amount of trade between England and Ireland/ NI/ Scotland is a tiny fraction of that between UK and Europe.

Or, along similar lines, whether any tangible benefits could be measured during the 1968-1971 experiment when we were on the same time for over 3 years straight?

There was some empirical evidence of reduced deaths and serious injuries, overall, on the earlier experiment but it was overshadowed by the belligerence of the Scottish fraternity claiming increased fatalities and injuries in the mornings, despite an overall reduction in Scotland.