Different times zones all over the world can prove a business stumbling block

Unless you’ve got a fancy DAB radio or new-fangled mobile phone, then you will be given a nice little surprise when you wake up, as the clocks went back this morning from 2am back to 1am, marking the end of the British Summer Time (soon to be renamed British Mild And Cloudy, But At Least It’s Not Raining Time). You may live to lament the wasted opportunity of an extra hours sleep…

Hearing that the clocks are going back evokes a similar reaction to most people – the dread of colder days, darker mornings and less sunshine.

In this modern day and age, is there any need for the BST/GMT alterations at all? There has been calls at Westminster to scrap the annual procedures altogether. However, the Scottish National Party remains against the ideas, as many parts of Scotland would be plunged into darkness for much of the day if the clocks were not altered, as was seen between 1968 and 1971 when BST was maintained all year long. The UK saw a reduction in road-traffic accidents by the thousands, and it has been forecast that the economy would see a boost of one billion pounds if the experiment were tried again. Conservative MP Tom Yeo believes that the public opinion is “Strongly in favour” of the change. Research has also shown that leaving BST helps people sleep much easier.

Dr. Ian McKee MSP is, in his own words ‘old enough to remember’ when the three-year long experiment took place, and described the time-alteration in a recent interview as “absolutely devastating…we have tried, the experiment failed, we must carry on as we do now.”