EU to recommend abolishing DST

Harry Palmr

DST is the new bendy banana or cucumber for idiots and Eurosceptics.

Gallee

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

No.

They are keeping summertime. That’s the proposal.

How are they keeping Summertime also called DST if that’s what they are trying to get rid of? What am I missing? The piece in the journal is throwing me
“The Commission will be proposing that when we move the clocks forward on the last Sunday in March 2021 we won’t be moving the clocks forward or backwards anymore after that”.

If DST is going to be discarded how can you advance the clocks in March 2021 without visa versa in oct?



Just so I can get this straight...the proposal is to get rid of DST? Correct?
DST is the process of bringing clock forward in March and back in Oct? Correct? Sorry about this but I am not seeing this too easily.

Andy From Sligo

oh bloody hell is that right 2021 ! - i didn't realise it was that far off!

Andy From Sligo

Andy From Sligo wrote: »

no, but it could be a factor with a lot of people if EU keep imposing more things ...

Probably, Andy, if those imposed things included allowing Turkey or Serbia to join the EU, or if it included ignoring opposition to excessive immigration. Changing the clocks will be about as controversial as when the British imposed GMT on the Irish, who used Dublin Mean Time, in 1916.

Not sure if the Europhobic British tabloids would like that analogy to be highlighted, though.

Cork Boy 53

Gallee wrote: »

How are they keeping Summertime also called DST if that’s what they are trying to get rid of? What am I missing? The piece in the journal is throwing me
“The Commission will be proposing that when we move the clocks forward on the last Sunday in March 2021 we won’t be moving the clocks forward or backwards anymore after that”.

If DST is going to be discarded how can you advance the clocks in March 2021 without visa versa in oct?



Just so I can get this straight...the proposal is to get rid of DST? Correct?
DST is the process of bringing clock forward in March and back in Oct? Correct? Sorry about this but I am not seeing this too easily.

No you are incorrect.What is being proposed is that EU countries will be on GMT+1 all year round from March 2021 onwards. If each member country agrees to this DST will be the standard time all year round.

Gallee

Cork Boy 53 wrote: »

No you are incorrect.What is being proposed is that EU countries will be on GMT+1 all year round from March 2021 onwards. If each member country agrees to this DST will be the standard time all year round.

Many thanks - appreciate the reply and answer.

Irish Kings

It'll be dark until after 10am in the winter mornings, this will negatively effect anyone who works outdoors, but as most people are desk drones these days, and dislike getting up early, and like sitting up late, it won't matter. It'll suit most people.

irelandrover

Irish Kings wrote: »

It'll be dark until after 10am in the winter mornings, this will negatively effect anyone who works outdoors, but as most people are desk drones these days, and dislike getting up early, and like sitting up late, it won't matter. It'll suit most people.

This doesnt make sense to me. There was 7.5 hours daylight last year on the shortest day of the year. If you work outside you got 7.5 hours daylight. After the change you will get 7.5 hours daylight.

seamus

Cork Boy 53 wrote: »

No you are incorrect.What is being proposed is that EU countries will be on GMT+1 all year round from March 2021 onwards. If each member country agrees to this DST will be the standard time all year round.

No, you're actually incorrect.

The proposal here is that all EU countries will stop moving clocks back and forward. It's not that all EU countries will engage in clock harmonisation.

At present there are three time zones in the EU:
UTC (Us, the UK and Portugal)
UTC + 1 (almost everyone else)
UTC + 2 (the far eastern edges like Poland, Romania and Greece)

When the clocks change, everyone moves by an hour. So France remains one hour ahead, Greece remain two hours ahead.

This won't change under this proposal. We'll simply stop moving clocks back and forward, but France will still be an hour ahead of us.

We will also have a choice whether to move the clocks forward to UTC + 1 and stay there. Or to change back to UTC and stay there. In the latter case, we would now be two hours behind France and three behind Greece.

We're one of the few countries that can make this choice in practice. France (and most others on UTC+1) are going to have to go with the majority, otherwise you could end up in a scenario where Germany is an hour behind France. Which would make no sense.

We can kind of do what we like, as we'll always be at least an hour behind central europe. In astronomical terms, we should really be on UTC minus 1, but I do love those sweet summer bright evenings, I'd be happy with +1.

Riskymove

Irish Kings wrote: »

It'll be dark until after 10am in the winter mornings, this will negatively effect anyone who works outdoors, but .

but you will have an extra hour of light in the evening for your outdoor work

Riskymove

seamus wrote: »

We're one of the few countries that can make this choice in practice. France (and most others on UTC+1) are going to have to go with the majority, otherwise you could end up in a scenario where Germany is an hour behind France. Which would make no sense.
.

this is what is leading to the concerns about the UK retaining DST

They would be an hour behind us for part of the year despite being east of us

as you say there could be all sorts of anomalies unless everyone participates

VinLieger

Irish Kings wrote: »

It'll be dark until after 10am in the winter mornings, this will negatively effect anyone who works outdoors, but as most people are desk drones these days, and dislike getting up early, and like sitting up late, it won't matter. It'll suit most people.

It will only negatively affect them if they refuse to adapt, the number of hours of daylight will still be exactly the same so they should just adjust their days accordingly

Laois_Man

VinLieger wrote: »

It will only negatively affect them if they refuse to adapt, the number of hours of daylight will still be exactly the same so they should just adjust their days accordingly

Where is the benefit of changing the current system of you're just gonna shift your day every day instead of shifting the clock twice a year?

VinLieger

Laois_Man wrote: »

Where is the benefit of changing the current system of you're just gonna shift your day every day instead of shifting the clock twice a year?

Because shifting the clocks has proven through several studies to be bad for peoples health, that is why it is being discussed at an EU level, also its an archaic system that was put in place when the majority were still working outdoors and to make better us of the daylight

It would only be a small minority shifting their day that need daylight for their work these days.

Laois_Man

VinLieger wrote: »

Because shifting the clocks has proven through several studies to be bad for peoples health, that is why it is being discussed at an EU level, also its an archaic system that was put in place when the majority were still working outdoors and to make better us of the daylight


Also it would only be a small minority shifting their day that need daylight for their work.

Studies? Nonsense!! People will perform a study to say whatever they want it to say. You lose an hours sleep once a year and it happens on a Sunday when most people don't have to get up at a set time anyway, so they still get their ~8 hours. Any effect on health has to do with the fact there will only be 8ish hours of daylight during December and January, not because the clocks have changed!

Even if it were true, shifting your day by one hour and changing the clock is the exact same darn thing!

The problem to me is "winter time" lasts too long. Clocks should be going back about 3 or 4 weeks later than they do and going forward again about 6 or 7 weeks earlier than they do!

irelandrover

Laois_Man wrote: »

Studies? Nonsense!! People will perform a study to say whatever they want it to say. You lose an hours sleep once a year and it happens on a Sunday when most people don't have to get up at a set time anyway, so they still get their ~8 hours. Any effect on health has to do with the fact there will only be 8ish hours of daylight during December and January, not because the clocks have changed!

Even if it were true, shifting your day by one hour and changing the clock is the exact same darn thing!

The problem to me is "winter time" lasts too long. Clocks should be going back about 3 or 4 weeks later than they do and going forward again about 6 or 7 weeks earlier than they do!

I go to work for about 8 every day. I finish up and head home at 5. In the middle of winter i go to work in the dark and go home in teh dark.

I'd say that is the situation for a lot of people. If the time didnt change then i would go to work in teh dark and come home in daylight. It sounds a lot better to me.

VinLieger

Laois_Man wrote: »

Studies? Nonsense!! People will perform a study to say whatever they want it to say.

Great way to discuss things, just dismiss the numerous experts and studies that disagree with you.


Also in literally every poll taken on the subject its massively unpopular and people vote for it to be scrapped but i assume these polls are people saying what they are told to as well?

Laois_Man

VinLieger wrote: »

Great way to discuss things, just dismiss the numerous experts and studies that disagree with you.


Also in literally every poll taken on the subject its massively unpopular and people vote for it to be scrapped but i assume these polls are people saying what they are told to as well?

I didn't say I disagree with winter being bad for people's health. It's depressing. But changing the clocks is not the cause of winter!

It being dark at 9:30am is also going to be pretty depressing!

facehugger99

Laois_Man wrote: »

Studies? Nonsense!!

Who need studies.

It's how you feel about stuff that really matters, right?

Laois_Man

facehugger99 wrote: »

Who need studies.

It's how you feel about stuff that really matters, right?

For every expert you find saying DST is bad for health (I've never even seen one, someone states they exist plentifully and it becomes accepted), I'll find you ten that says the opposite.....

I reached out to sleep expert Clete Kushida, MD, PhD, medical director of the Stanford Sleep Medicine Center.

According to Kushida, there are no clear studies on how DST directly affects our physical and mental health. Although some research suggests DST has negative effects, such as the study by scientists at Stanford and Johns Hopkins that found a small, but significant increase in fatal car accidents on the Monday after DST in the spring, other research yielded findings that are tricky to interpret. For example, a study found a 25 percent increase in the number of heart attacks the Monday after we “spring forward," and a 21 percent decline in the number of heart attacks on Tuesday after DST in the fall. Yet, the total number of heart attacks the week after DST didn't change.

https://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2017/11/04/stanford-expert-weighs-in-on-daylight-saving-time-and-the-extra-hour-of-sleep/

Elmer Blooker

Anyone who wants it to be dark at 9.30am needs their head examined in my opinion. Anyway the dark evenings don't even last that long, by mid January it is bright at 5pm when it was dark at that time a month earlier.
I think someone should tell these EU bureaucrats that the earth isn't flat and is in fact round and the northern hemisphere tilts away from the sun during winter.
Why would anyone want it to get bright earlier in mid summer when we are all asleep and then lose an hour of daylight in the evening when we are awake?

An idiotic proposal that you expect from Brussels!

But changing the clocks is not the cause of winter!

Brilliant!!

VinLieger

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

Why would anyone want it to get bright earlier in mid summer when we are all asleep and then lose an hour of daylight in the evening when we are awake?

Thats not what would be happening, the proposal is for everyone to stick with summer time, but ultimately it is up to each country to decide. I would hope we stuck with summer time.

Elmer Blooker

VinLieger wrote: »

Thats not what would be happening, the proposal is for everyone to stick with summer time, but ultimately it is up to each country to decide. I would hope we stuck with summer time.

The sun rising an hour earlier in summer (around 3.45am?) at the expense of losing an hour of daylight in the evening makes no sense whatsoever.

The Scandinavians just put up with their dark winters and accept that the reason for the darkness is astronomical and nothing to do with clocks!

irelandrover

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

The sun rising an hour earlier in summer (around 3.45am?) at the expense of losing an hour of daylight in the evening makes no sense whatsoever.

The Scandinavians just put up with their dark winters and accept that the reason for the darkness is astronomical and nothing to do with clocks!

Thats why nobody is proposing that.

BarryD2

seamus wrote: »

Swings and roundabouts. The sun setting at 4 o'clock in the afternoon is just as absurd as it not rising till 10am.

You can't control the basic physics, only the labels we apply to it. Personally I feel that a later sunset in the winter would be worth having the later sunrise.

Absurd only to those that lie about in bed in the morning and stay up all night on boards! There should be roughly the same amount of daylight either side of midday. That's the whole concept of midday and that is 'wintertime' - a pejorative term if ever there was one. Should be changed to 'normaltime'.

For those that rise early for whatever reason, maximum daylight is valued and should be retained. If people feel that longer daylight in winter evenings is more valuable, well let them get up earlier and retune their diurnal rhythms.

seamus

BarryD2 wrote: »

Absurd only to those that lie about in bed in the morning and stay up all night on boards!

Oh, if only!

For those that rise early for whatever reason, maximum daylight is valued and should be retained. If people feel that longer daylight in winter evenings is more valuable, well let them get up earlier and retune their diurnal rhythms.

Well, you know it's a matter of opinion. Maybe people should get up later and retune their rhythms instead of insisting that everyone else get up early to suit them.

Public opinion seems pretty one-sided on this, and the bright-morningers are firmly in a minority.

Elmer Blooker

irelandrover wrote: »

Thats why nobody is proposing that.

It seems to me that as Seamus says the bright morningers (like me) are firmly in a minority.
Sending groggy kids out to school, cycling etc, in the dark is absolutely reckless and irresponsible. At least in the evenings they will be more alert and as I said earlier the dark evenings don't last long,

seamus

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

It seems to me that as Seamus says the bright morningers (like me) are firmly in a minority.
Sending groggy kids out to school, cycling etc, in the dark is absolutely reckless and irresponsible. At least in the evenings they will be more alert and as I said earlier the dark evenings don't last long,

Studies have shown internationally that children would be better served starting school later (10 or 11am) and finishing later. This allows for more sleep and better alertness during school hours.

So if the "cycling to school in the dark" argument has merit (which it probably does), that's an argument for later school starting rather than moving the clocks back.

Since we realistically sync ourselves to the clocks rather than the astronomical rhythms, moving the clocks back by an hour doesn't give us any extra sleep. Whereas starting school (and work) later, would.

prunudo

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

It seems to me that as Seamus says the bright morningers (like me) are firmly in a minority.
Sending groggy kids out to school, cycling etc, in the dark is absolutely reckless and irresponsible. At least in the evenings they will be more alert and as I said earlier the dark evenings don't last long,

100% agree with you. At present its mid January before you see a change in the mornings. A dark wet morning till 10am isn't going to be fun.
At present the evenings are never really an issue, by the time you come back from Christmas holidays i think you've already gained more than 10 mins in evening light.

dxhound2005

Will this mean the end of a grand stretch in the evenings?