British Summer Time

Baroness Corston Excerpts

Wednesday 25th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Wilcox]

We consult regularly on this. The Central European Time zone, which is the area that we would come into—with France, Germany, Holland and Spain—is one thing, but there are two other zones, which have different times. We are very concerned, as we are a tiny country, not to have too many changes as we cross over borders. That would be far too confusing for business, let alone for everybody else. As far as China is concerned, I do not believe that it is a democracy. People there have this imposed on them and I am not quite sure what the average Chinaman would say if I asked him.

[Baroness Corston]

My Lords, will the Minister cast her mind back to the 1960s, when we had a two-year experiment involving a change to British Summer Time, which was voted for overwhelmingly by Parliament? Does she recall that two years later Parliament voted overwhelmingly to go back to the status quo, because the experience was very depressing? Even in rural Somerset, I used to take children to primary school in the dark. Back then, we all walked—I shudder to think of the effect of people rushing to school in the dark in cars. It was a total disaster.

[Baroness Wilcox]

The noble Baroness is quite right. I have a timeline here that expresses exactly what she has just said and I am completely with her on this.