One thing guaranteed to upset the Scots is to suggest that UK time be advanced by one hour to give lighter evenings, especially in winter when it currently starts getting dark around 4pm at the latest. The Scots, being so far North, have a problem with this due to the fact that the sun wouldn’t rise until going on for 10am.

This week, David Cameron mentioned the clock change issue on Thursday this week at a press conference on tourism (a report of the speech live from the Guardian) :

9.16am: Cameron is taking questions now. Someone asks about moving the clocks forward in the UK, so that Britain is in the same timezone as most of the EU. A private member’s bill on this issue is going to be debated in parliament later this year.

Cameron says the government will look at this issue. But there is opposition to the plan in Scotland, and the north of England. Cameron says he does not want Britain to have two time zones. Change will only happen if the public are persuaded to accept it, he says.

What I am finding confusing is whether he meant moving UK time one hour forward all year round to put the UK on Central European Time (CET) or to leave the clocks on British Summer Time all year around.

The Private Members Bill he mentioned in the speech doesn’t help as it mentions both possible outcomes as areas for investigation :

– Daylight Saving Bill (Rebecca Harris, Con, Castle Point) – Bill to require the Secretary of State to conduct a cross-departmental analysis of the potential costs and benefits of advancing time by one hour for all, or part of, the year; to require the Secretary of State to take certain action in the light of that analysis; and for connected purposes;

I have heard all manner of possible outcomes supposedly being proposed as a result of that speech including the suggestion that it is being considered to please the EU. It would appear from the Private Members Bill that they haven’t really chosen any particular option though and that the current debate is just space filler during the end of Summer slack news weeks.

The only thing certain is that the Scots will whine on for some considerable time until the analysis is complete and the suggestions made. And then they will whine some more, joined no doubt, by a whole flotilla of vested interests and lobby groups.

Personally, I would welcome the change to lighter evenings all year around (move the time on an hour from GMT and keep the Summer time clock change).

There are those that would suggest that you can achieve the same by leaving the clocks alone and getting up an hour earlier. They also write to the Telegraph suggesting the same and are obviously twats of the highest order as it would still be dark when the majority of people are coming home from work and school in the winter regardless of what time they got up.

I will wait and see what happens next, although I won’t hold my breath as this one gets debated twice a year without fail and bugger all ever happens.