Who actually benefits from changing the clocks?

[shockwaze]

Kids up at 5:30. Pretty sure that the same thing has happened in many, many houses this morning.

It's just an hour, but so disruptive to children.

Who benefits? Winds me up every year.

@Catsmere maybe we should just all divide into States according to our want to enjoy extended outside daylight in nice weather. Those who don’t want to do anything outside and sit in the house, go to the States that don’t have it, and those of us who like to do stuff outside in extended daylight, go to States that do have it? And then not complain if you are in the wrong State according to your wants, rather than either preference enforcing theirs on an entire country?

It's a small matter, it happens twice a year, it is all forgotten and all kids and animals adjust in a few days.

I don’t like it. I’d rather the light at the other end of the day. Supposedly so the kids go to school in daylight but come December up here in Scotland they go and come back in the dark anyway.

Bst should be GMT +2.

It's not "winter time" it's called GMT and is the standard time zone for the UK.
This is normal light for the UK.

The change is to BST in the Spring.

What, so we're on the same time zone as Ukraine and Belarus?!? 😂

It's not just the choice of going to school in the dark or coming home in the dark, it's also temperatures. It's both cold and dark in the mornings, but just dark by late afternoon. The temperature is at it's lowest point in the hour before sunrise, which is when kids would be going to school if the clocks didn't go back. We'd be putting maximum travel to work / school at the point when the roads and pavements are at their iciest.

The answer is not to put the clocks forward in spring.

I'd swap an hour at night time in the summer for an hour in the mornings during the winter.

I rely heavily on my SAD lamp to get me through October to February.

@shockwaze do you really think farmers have lighting all over there fields and farm what planet are you on. We have a light on the edge of a barn and some inside but outside it’s dark. Maybe we should get street lights around the acres of fields just so you kids don’t have to wake up early.

This is what I wonder. What is the point of BST really? It is surely light enough for long enough in this country in the summer anyway? Countries near the equator seem to manage with just 12 hours of daylight all year round, more or less. It is a nightmare trying to get kids to go to bed when it is still clearly daylight outside, and I don't really see the point.

And if you live in parts of Scotland, it stays light to around midnight in the summer. Nice on a holiday, but probably not essential if you live there?

Why would you say such a stupid thing like that? Do you think everyone down South lives in a Surrey commuter town and there's no rural areas? I live in rural Sussex and I'll think you'll find there are lots of farms throughout Hampshire, Kent and Sussex, I'm fed up with assumptions about Southerners on MN.

I’m another grateful dog walker after spending many days stumbling around a dark field with a torch before school/work.
But yes - it is really very much for the farmers benefit.

During WW2 double summertime was introduced GMT+2 so it stayed light until almost midnight. Between 1968 and 1971 we did stay on summertime, I remember it vaguely but it meant children were walking to school in the dark in winter so we have had the present arrangement since then.

These are two separate things, no? Living in the south and also not happening to know many farmers?

I interpreted that to mean that people living further north and farmers wherever they live are the ones who see the most benefit.

Farmers apparently

But I thought we were more advanced with technology!

On day 1 it’s fine because it’s normally a Sunday and we can lie in.

And then on Monday we all oversleep!!

It to me read as if Southerners don't have a clue about farmers and rural life...

Im as feminist as they come but even I realise not everything is a feminist issue.

It's got nothing to do with misogyny or disadvantages to women.

As others have pointed out we are on 'normal' time now and we put the clocks forward to make the most of daylight hours.

I think that would work well as it's light far too early in the morning to sleep well- the bloody birds are singing at 3am! But I'd love to be able to sit out on summer evening until at least 10pm.

Did you know you don't have to read or reply to threads?
You can also hide them if you find them annoying.
School holidays maybe?

No change to routines here. Our alarms wake us at 6.30 and I go and wake my toddler at 7.30.

I personally really enjoy working an A&E night shift for an extra hour with no extra pay or time off for it.

Said no one ever. Actually not sure why it's legal. The faster we stop going along with this nonsense the better.

People act like it's a surprise every year 🙄

Pretty sure your kids will get used to it like every child ever

Could they not try and have the same people working the night shift for both clock changes so that in March you work an hour less for the same pay?

I'd prefer it if we just stuck to GMT all year round.

I'm appreciative of the lighter mornings at the moment, I have to be up early anyway so it's nice to have daylight to do it. I'd rather get up in the light and come home in the dark than the other way around.

I wish! I somehow never get the hour off, I think I've only ever had 2 in my 17+ years!

I think it's already complex dealing with trying to create schedules that they don't add an extra layer of complexity to it which I do understand.

But expecting people to work for free shouldn't be the answer. They could consider paying us/adding the extra hour to our time owed or something. But we have all long since accepted they would never.