Daylight Saving Bill

Eilidh Whiteford Excerpts

Friday 20th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Chope]

As a former Transport Minister, far be it from me to criticise the Department for Transport. I have to say, though, that most of the alleged benefits—by which I mean the reduction in the numbers of road casualties—would occur in Scotland, but given that road safety is, as I understand it, a devolved matter, if the Scottish Parliament wishes to take action to improve road safety, including by doing something along the lines suggested in the Bill, surely it must be a matter for the Scottish Parliament. I am conscious that on Second Reading mention was made of the fact that during the last experiment in the north of Scotland, notwithstanding changes being made to drink-driving laws and so on, the number of road casualties actually increased.

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

One of the most significant factors is that over the past year the number of road accidents in Scotland has fallen. Had we passed the Bill on its First Reading, we might have misattributed that reduction to the effects of daylight. In actual fact, however, road accidents have far less to do with the amount of daylight than with other factors, such as how people drive and the weather conditions, for example. I urge caution over some of that evidence.

[Mr Chope]

The hon. Lady’s words are very wise. My experience as road safety Minister in the Department for Transport leads me to believe that we must be careful not to draw the wrong conclusions from experiments. My view is that a stronger law on drug-driving would have a significant impact on road safety in our country. But that is not a debate for this morning.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

That is an excellent point. I hope that it was heard by my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris), because she is one of the wisest Members in the House, and has handled the Bill with so much charm that she almost persuaded me to support it. Perhaps she and the Bill’s sponsors will accept amendment 23.

[Dr Whiteford]

As the hon. Member for Glasgow South (Mr Harris) pointed out, there is a range of opinion in the nations, as one would expect. In that sense, having one person from each of the devolved Administrations would by no means be an adequate way of taking into account the wide range of public opinion on these issues. As I understand it, time is a devolved matter in Northern Ireland, a consequence of the very asymmetric devolution across the islands. Northern Ireland will be very affected by this, but the Assembly effectively has the power of veto under the current devolution arrangements.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I think that that wanders slightly beyond the parameters of this rather narrow amendment, although I do accept that there could be an unlimited number of people to try to represent all shades of opinion, but I think that it would be a good idea if the one person to represent Scotland represented the majority party in Scotland, which would clearly be sensible, and perhaps one or two hon. Members present would be able to volunteer to do that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr MacNeil]

It is not just crofters in the outer Hebrides about whom I worry; I worry about the commuters of Milton Keynes as well. We are talking about human experiences, and it was not the people of the outer Hebrides who were responsible for the reversal of the time change; it was the good people of Milton Keynes, who were experiencing that particular misery over three winters. We should bear it in mind that the Bill commits us to at least 15 months of really dark winters, although I hope that my amendment will get around that to some extent.

To use the obvious example, how do we feel when we have to get out of bed on a dark and dreary morning, rather than when the sun is up? Our entire mood is changed because of the lack of sunlight. If the clocks are changed, nearly all of us will have to wake up and go out in the dark for a longer period of the year. As I said earlier, Portuguese children were found to be irritable and have poor attention, and according to the national association of teachers many fell asleep in the classroom. It is worth noting that this is damaging to young people’s education and that divorce rates increase significantly, so even an experiment has dangerous consequences for many people. On energy consumption, we have heard from Lighter Later that there could be serious energy cost savings as a result of people not needing to consume energy in the evenings. As I stated on Second Reading, this is erroneous, because people would need to turn on appliances on colder, darker winter mornings.

[Dr Whiteford]

I am concerned about the winter morning issue. Last week my heating in London broke down and I did not even notice because the temperature here is so much higher than it is in more northerly parts. I think people would put on their heating during the coldest part of the night and also when energy is at its most expensive, which will have an impact on not only energy consumption but fuel poverty.

[Mr MacNeil]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. I know that the cold in Banff and Buchan is balanced only by the warm hearts of its people, and certainly by their good sense in yet again returning an SNP Member. Her points are well made and serious, and indeed they are backed up not only by her own experience, but by evidence from Indiana in the United States and from Portugal. The phones have been busy between my office and Portugal in the last wee while. Mr Rui Agostinho, director of Lisbon’s astronomical observatory, the institution responsible for legal time in Portugal, has said that a company contracted by the European Commission at the time showed that the energy savings gained were ultimately lost with the increase of energy consumption during the morning.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Davey]

Of course, the devolved Administrations will have access to the report and the data on which it was based. That is how the Government have approached the whole issue. We have worked hard to get consensus at this stage, because we want consensus at all stages. I hope that the hon. Gentleman accepts that assurance. I have checked the record of the Committee stage, and it appears that I made it clear on no fewer than 13 separate occasions that the Government would not expect to carry out a trial or make any change if there was clear opposition from any part of the country. I hope that that reassures my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute and other right hon. and hon. Members. It is clear that we want consensus.

[Dr Whiteford]

I do not intend to take up too much of the House’s time today. I regret that it is so easy to use the procedures of the House to inhibit rather than enable constructive debate on an issue that is so serious, particularly for my constituents in the north of Scotland.

When we debated this matter before, I approached it with an open mind. I thought that after 40 years it was important to consider the evidence, the changes since the last review and possible ways of moving forward. I was keen to speak on this group of amendments, particularly amendments 16 and 17, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), because I am concerned that exaggerated claims have been made for the outcomes of the Bill. When I looked at the evidence, I found that it did not always stack up: it seemed simplistic; it drew conclusions that could not be attributed to the evidence presented; most of it was theoretical and there was little empirical data; and, above all, it took little account of other attendant factors that might prove critical in the overall picture.

Any policy changes need to be based on the reality of geography, the environment and our body clock, not to put too fine a point on it. The reality for people in the north and west of these islands is that in the heart of winter we have only seven hours of daylight a day at most. People already go to and from school and work in the dark. The question is not just how we use the limited amount of daylight available to us; perhaps more importantly, it is how we minimise the inconveniences of that limited amount of daylight, and of working and living in the dark.

For me, the critical issue and the reason why amendments 16 and 17 are so important is that the dark days coincide with the cold winter months. It is not just the darkness; the cold compounds the effects of the dark. In more northerly parts and on higher ground, temperatures are significantly lower. The coldest time of day is the hours just before dawn, which is exactly when more people will be moving around, going to school or work, if the changes are introduced.

In Aberdeenshire, gritters grit our roads for seven months of the year. They do not do it every day, but from October to April we must protect our commuters from frosty roads, which are undoubtedly dangerous. One thing that has come out of the debate on these amendments and others is that it is hard to attribute road safety to factors involving daylight or darkness. It is much easier to say that a whole lot of other factors have an effect: driver behaviour, road conditions and, above all, weather conditions. These can be treacherous not just for drivers but for pedestrians. One need only look at an accident and emergency department on a morning when pavements are icy to see people with broken wrists, arms and hips. The dangers are real, and they are exacerbated in the hours before daylight when the ice has not yet melted. That is key, and it is why people in my part of the world feel so strongly about the issue. They do not want to expose themselves to more of the same.

Some of the other myths that need to be discussed a bit more include the myth about tourism. The great luxury of being on holiday is that people can get up exactly when they like and do whatever they like. If they are on a holiday involving field sports, they might get up in the middle of the night anyway, to optimise their use of time. By the same token, if they want to lie in until 10 or 11 am, they can.

I welcome the Government’s approach in saying that they want consensus, but as other Members have said, unless there is something in legislation to pin the matter down, it is hard to have confidence in that kind of language. Both the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr Reid) and that tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar—I do not know that I say that quite as well as the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg)—seek those reassurances.

[Mr Davey]

Will the hon. Lady confirm that in the Bill we have done what the SNP asked us to do? What we said in Committee and in our press releases, and what I have reconfirmed today, goes further than the SNP asked us to, in order to ensure that we represented Scottish interests and got consensus.

[Dr Whiteford]

I absolutely recognise the progress that the Minister has made. It is good, but we need safeguards. I am not the only person who takes with a little pinch of salt some of Government Front Benchers’ assurances. We would like the issue pinned down in a way that will give us assurances and alleviate some of the concerns of people in Scotland, who face a disproportionate negative impact from any trial that goes ahead. I would like some sort of trial to gather empirical data, and I think that the proposals made are one way to do so without exposing people to unnecessary risk.

[Mr MacNeil]

Does my hon. Friend feel, as I do, that the safeguards that we are looking for are a way of fixing the goalposts? At the moment, there is a danger—the Minister refused to say that it was not possible—that the Government might renege, change their mind, choose another policy or override Scotland. We just want the goalposts fixed so that we know the terms of reference. Then we could move on quite happily.

[Dr Whiteford]

That is right, and I agree.

I will conclude my remarks, because I know that other people want to speak. Ultimately, it is a quality of life issue. One thing that struck me after the last debate on the Bill was that a huge number of people from England, mostly older people who remember the last trial, got in touch with me by letter, phone or e-mail. They all said the same thing: “This was a disaster when they did it in the ’70s.” They found it miserable getting up, going to work and delivering things in the dark. People who remember it did not like it. Ultimately, that has to be our arbiter: is this going to be helpful for our quality of life? I know that it is going to impact more on my part of the world than some other parts of these islands. For the sake of our health and well-being, we need to think carefully before messing around with something that might not need to be changed.

[Philip Davies]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris) on getting her private Member’s Bill this far. She has certainly got much further than I have with any of mine. I think mine got no further than being heavily defeated on Second Reading—largely by my hon. Friends! I also commend my hon. Friend for the way in which she has conducted herself, always remaining in good humour. In common with my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg), I think she has great charm; I thought that she was charming only me, so I was disappointed to find out that she had charmed my hon. Friend as well!

I shall speak to the amendments I have tabled in this group, starting with amendment 30, which gets to the nub of the issue. It is similar to the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr Reid), who wanted to ensure that the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly agreed to any trial before it went ahead. My amendment would achieve something similar, but it relates to subsection (4) rather than subsection (3).

As the provision is drafted, we have the curious position whereby we have to

“obtain the agreement of the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland”—

something I wholeheartedly support—

yet only

“consult the Scottish Ministers and the Welsh Ministers.”

I have heard the debate and heard the assurances both from the Minister and from my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point that, as far as they are concerned, no trial will go ahead if there is opposition from Scotland, Wales or other parts of the United Kingdom. That is fine: I accept those assurances and I accept their intention. What we have to deal with, however, is what is in the Bill before us, and notwithstanding all the good intentions, that is not what the Bill says.