Plan to bring UK clocks forward

[whole diary]

[Chris from Nailsea]

From the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page):

Longer evenings could move a step closer with a government plan to move UK^▸ (United Kingdom) clocks forward an extra hour.

A "tourism strategy" will include a plan to move the clocks in line with most of Europe, bringing lighter evenings but darker mornings.

Tourism chiefs and safety campaigners support the move, but there are fears in Scotland about road accidents.

Ministers want to be satisfied the country backs the plan before giving the go-ahead, the BBC understands.

Last year, Prime Minister David Cameron indicated he was willing to consider a switch.

"The argument will be won when people across the country feel comfortable with the change," he said in August. "It's up to those who want to make the change to make the argument to try to convince people right across the country that it's a good thing. People who like taking part in sporting activity and would like longer days are already quite easy to sway. That's the key to winning this argument."

The proposals will be published by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport in the coming week, the BBC has been told.

Bringing the clocks forward by one hour would bring the UK into line with Central European Time (CET^▸ (Controlled Emission Toilet)), which is Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) plus one hour.

It would mean, for instance, that instead of the sun rising in Newcastle-upon-Tyne at 0714 and setting at 1723, as it does at this time of year, it would rise at 0814 and set at 1823.

Tourism bosses say the number of overseas visitors would increase if summer evenings were lighter and they estimate the benefits to the economy could total billions of pounds.

But there have been fears expressed in Scotland that putting the clocks forward would increase road accidents in the darker mornings.

A parliamentary bill requiring the government to conduct analysis of the costs and benefits of shifting the clocks forward received MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament)' initial approval in December.

A three-year experiment to keep BST all year took place between 1968 and 1971, but was not made permanent.

[Timmer]

Something I have wanted to see for a long time is having BST all year round.

If not, then why don't we follow the US who now dont wait until the end of March to put their clocks forward. I think its light enough in the mornings to put them forward at the start of March rather than wait until the end of the month so if we have an early spring we can make use of the lighter evenings. Winter is long enough without making the evenings darker for longer than need be.

I'm not sure about the current proposal that is being talked about to match Europe all year round making summer GMT +2 with winter GMT +1. Lets make it simple and have BST (GMT +1) all year round and stop messing with the clocks twice year.

[tramway]

I'm sure the jolly Scots are sooo looking forward to not seeing the sun until gone 10 oclock in the morning mid winter time.

[JayMac]

I've already brought my clock forward. Couldn't see it on the mantlepiece, so its now on the coffee table.

[willc]

Lets make it simple and have BST (GMT +1) all year round and stop messing with the clocks twice year.

And how would that be simple? We'd be on the same time as the rest of Europe over the winter and an hour behind in the summer. Try writing Eurostar, airline and ferry timetables to make sense of that.

I'm sure the jolly Scots are sooo looking forward to not seeing the sun until gone 10 oclock in the morning mid winter time.

The Inuit, Scandinavians, etc, have all coped for thousands of years and lived to tell the tale, so I'm sure the Scots can too. And the Cornish and Welsh may feel just as aggrieved. Sunrise in Penzance on December 21 would not be until 9.18am. Cardiff would only be a couple of minutes ahead of that.

[grahame]

I've already brought my clock forward. Couldn't see it on the mantlepiece, so its now on the coffee table.

Perhaps in the interest of giving powers back to the community, we could allow each area of the country to set its own time,  but have a separate railway time - it's been done before - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_time - and surely the modern technology would help us deal with any issues.

Railway timetables to use computer / unix time.   I'm posting this is 1298337209 ... just one number to give me year, month, day, hour, minute and second!  And no arguments in that about daylight saving.

[inspector_blakey]

Railway timetables to use computer / unix time.   I'm posting this is 1298337209 ... just one number to give me year, month, day, hour, minute and second!  And no arguments in that about daylight saving.

Is that why Excel yaks up a seemingly random number (5 digits I think...) if you convert a text date cell, e.g. 21 Feb 11 into number format by mistake?

[TerminalJunkie]

Is that why Excel yaks up a seemingly random number (5 digits I think...) if you convert a text date cell, e.g. 21 Feb 11 into number format by mistake?

Not really: the Excel number is the number of days since 1st Jan 1900*, while Unix time is the number of seconds since 1st Jan 1970.

* Well, almost: it includes 29 Feb 1900 (even though 1900 wasn't a leap year) because this was a bug in Lotus 123 and Microsoft wanted to make Excel compatible with it. There's also a 1904-mode (where it counts the days since 1st Jan 1904) which is to make it compatible with a Mac.

[grahame]

Not really: ...

Yes.   

Take the Excel number. Just subtract 27560 (or is that 27559?)  and multiply by 86400 and you have the Unix timestamp.

No.

The Excel figure has only daily granularity and would be impractical for a timetable.

[Timmer]

Lets make it simple and have BST (GMT +1) all year round and stop messing with the clocks twice year.

And how would that be simple? We'd be on the same time as the rest of Europe over the winter and an hour behind in the summer. Try writing Eurostar, airline and ferry timetables to make sense of that.

The same way we have managed with a different time zone to Europe throughout the year Will, just for less of the year throughout the summer. Anyway I can't actually see any changes being made because the government isn't really backing this private members bill by saying that all devolved governments will have to approve the change knowing full well the Scottish parliament will veto it.

[TerminalJunkie]

The Excel figure has only daily granularity [...]

Oh, no it doesn't </panto>

11am today is 40596.4583333333, and noon is 40596.5. Of course, you now start to enter the realm of rounding errors...

[grahame]

The Excel figure has only daily granularity [...]

Oh, no it doesn't </panto>

11am today is 40596.4583333333, and noon is 40596.5. Of course, you now start to enter the realm of rounding errors...

Ah ... IB's manifestantion was a five digit number - integer.   We could come up with a great time system here like we do for temperatures ... working in farengrade in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom) and centiheight on the mainland of Europe.

[Chris from Nailsea]

Things have never been the same in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom) since the dismalisation of the currency in February 1971 ... 

[tramway]

I've already brought my clock forward. Couldn't see it on the mantlepiece, so its now on the coffee table.

Perhaps in the interest of giving powers back to the community, we could allow each area of the country to set its own time,  but have a separate railway time - it's been done before - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_time - and surely the modern technology would help us deal with any issues.

Railway timetables to use computer / unix time.   I'm posting this is 1298337209 ... just one number to give me year, month, day, hour, minute and second!  And no arguments in that about daylight saving.

And they came up with IKEA to while away the dark hours, hate to think what the Scots would inflict on the world.

[bobm]

Highland dancing by candlelight - bit lethal with those swords on the floor to skip round...