Sunday, September 19, 2004
In the summertime
I suppose that the most controversial proposal on today's agenda is the suggestion that we introduce double British Summertime, moving the clocks forward by two hours rather than one so as to allow better use of sunlight hours and thus boosting tourism revenues by an estimated £1 billion per annum. I am not quite sure how that figure was arrived at as even with two hours of extra sunlight the average tourist can only stay awake so long and most people have a finite amount of money to spend on holiday anyway. Further to that it seems to me that income gained from daylight activities will be balanced out by expenditure lost in nightclubs etc. The whole exercise is more likely to be revenue-neutral.
British summertime was introduced to help farmers, not tourists. It can cause major inconvenience to a lot of people, especially if, like me, you forget to change your clocks. I do not believe that doubling it will go down that well with the populace nor that it will have any tangible benefits. I will therefore be voting to reject this particular measure. But hey, at least we are throwing up ideas for debate!
British summertime was introduced to help farmers, not tourists. It can cause major inconvenience to a lot of people, especially if, like me, you forget to change your clocks. I do not believe that doubling it will go down that well with the populace nor that it will have any tangible benefits. I will therefore be voting to reject this particular measure. But hey, at least we are throwing up ideas for debate!
