'Irish time border' fears see British Double Summer Time move rejected
Calls to adopt World War Two-era “Churchill time” over summer have been rejected over fears it would create an “Irish time border”.
A Labour MP’s push to adopt what’s dubbed “British Double Summer Time” – moving the clocks by two hours on Sunday (30th) instead of just one – were today nixed by the government, in part over worries about the move’s impact on Northern Ireland and Scotland.
If the UK moved ahead two hours while the Republic of Ireland only moved ahead by one, suggested Business Minister Justin Madders, the result would create a “time border” dividing the island of Ireland.
“This non-alignment could cause problems for transport, particularly aviation, the tourism trade and business in general, with higher impacts if there was only a part-year alignment,” he said.
Meanwhile Scotland would find itself waking into black night all year round, he said.
The north of Scotland would have “no daylight in the winter before 10am” under British Double Summer Time, he stated, adding: “In the rest of Scotland, sunrise would be at 9am, so children in Scotland would travel to and from school in darkness.”
During a debate in the House of Commons today (27th), Alex Mayer, the MP for Dunstable and Leighton Buzzard, said that double British Summer Time was an energy-saving experiment during the Second World War that was brought in by Winston Churchill.
“The crisis at the time meant that bold ideas were required,” she stated. “We needed to think outside the box.
"Today we face a different emergency, the climate crisis, but one where the same prescription could really help.”
Longer evenings mean household switch lights and heating on later; spread across millions of homes, Ms Mayer argued, that “adds up to a significant difference”.
“By choosing “Churchill Time”, we can reduce our energy use and lower our carbon footprint, she said, adding that brighter evenings would prevent road accidents and boost mood.
Questioning whether accidents and energy use would actually fall as mornings would be darker, Mr Madders said the government “believes the current daylight savings arrangement represent the optimal use of the available daylight across the UK”, adding that changing the current arrangement would require massive public consultation and analysis about its impact on businesses.
British Double Summer Time was in place from 1941 to 1945, and meant the UK was operating on the same clock as mainland Europe.
To get to that point, the government decided that clocks should not go back as usual in autumn 1940; the following year, clocks went forward by an hour in spring and then back again by an hour at the end of the summer.
After VE Day, the government decided to return to the normal system; already in Double Summer by that point, clocks went back by an hour in July 1945, then back by another hour that October. Normal British Summer Time changes came back in 1946.
British Double Summer Time was experimented with again in 1947, but rapidly abandoned.
The late 1960s saw a trial in which the UK kept British Summer Time all year round for three years, but dark winter mornings proved unpopular, especially in Scotland, and the standard system was brought back.