Daylight Saving Bill

Lord Beith Excerpts

Friday 3rd December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Harris]

Absolutely, and, as my hon. Friend will know, I have received an enormous number of representations from the tourist trade, which has some quite interesting claims about the measure’s benefits. The Bill might also benefit the retail sector and the leisure sector, including sporting organisations, so its revenue potential is enormous.

[Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)]

My hon. Friend seems rather dismissive of the concerns of those in a constituency such as mine—where opinion seems evenly divided for and against the change—who are genuinely worried, for example, about children having to wait for school buses at the end of country lanes on many more dark mornings than they do now. Those concerns cannot simply be ignored or regarded as procedural.

[Rebecca Harris]

Perhaps I should not have taken that intervention at this stage, as I shall cover that issue in great detail later, but all the evidence shows that there are three times as many accidents among children in the evening rush hour as there are in the morning, which is why all the road safety organisations very much support the measure.

Previous debates have often generated more heat than daylight. [Interruption.] I am sorry, but it had to be done, I am afraid. Indeed, I have experienced some quite passionate debate myself. Little did I imagine, when I innocently put my name into the ballot for private Members’ Bills, that I would later be attacked for being a barbecue-obsessed Essex girl or, worse, a national traitor trying to take us on to Berlin time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr MacNeil]

The hon. Lady leads me nicely on to the next part of my speech. In this, I am not only a Scottish nationalist—I feel the mantle of English nationalism, too. I care for the good people of England and I care that for two months of the year, in the area north of Manchester, they would not see sunrise before 9 o’clock in the morning. Somebody has to speak up for the good people of England and I am happy to do that, come what may.

[Sir Alan Beith]

I should hate to leave the hon. Gentleman with that burden unaided. Do his constituents, like mine, have the experience of seeing many children waiting at the roadside for school transport? Some are dropped by taxis from more remote locations and left to wait for the school bus. One of people’s real concerns is that if the clocks were changed, that would have to be done in the dark on many more occasions.

[Mr MacNeil]

The right hon. Gentleman has made a very good point. That is also one of my concerns, but I should like to see a compromise. I wish that others would meet me halfway, rather than railroading us into a situation that we would not enjoy.

Let me return to the issue of Indiana for a moment. The Indiana experiment showed that people spent an additional £5.5 million on energy—