Daylight saving: Turn clocks forward one hour

AUSTRALIANS are set to be more confused than ever as daylight saving gives us five different time zones.

DAYLIGHT saving begins in many states around the country tomorrow morning, and no wonder Australians are about to get confused.

From 2am on Sunday, the country will officially have five different time zones.

Designed to make the most of the summer months, residents from New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania, and the Australian Capital Territory will turn their clock forward one hour.

This means you won’t be woken by the morning sunlight anymore as we gain more daylight in our evenings.

However as QLD, the Northern Territory and Western Australia are not followers of daylight saving, the country is set to go into a time zone confusion.

Think of it like this.

Residents of Sydney, Melbourne, Hobart and Canberra will now be half an hour ahead of Adelaide, one hour ahead of Brisbane, one and a half hours ahead of Darwin and three hours ahead of Perth.

Confused much?

Telling the time is becoming a headache.

The differing time zones is due to the size of our land mass. Australia is usually divided up into three separate time zones, however with daylight saving this becomes five.

Queensland recognises Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST), but New South Wales (except Broken Hill), Victoria, Tasmania, and the Australian Capital Territory recognise Australian Eastern Daylight Time (AEDT).

South Australia and the town of Broken Hill in western New South Wales follow Australian Central Daylight Time (ACDT), the Northern Territory follows Australian Central Standard Time (ACST) and Western Australia stays on Australian Western Standard Time (AWST). Phew.

To add to the confusion, Queensland, who rejected a move to daylight saving 22 years ago, is considering a partial move to daylight saving suggesting that those in either southeast Queensland or southern Queensland, who are close to the NSW border, move their clocks forward one hour during summer, leaving the rest of the state operating under AEST.

It’s about creating more time to do this after work.

So what does this mean for our sleep?

Moving our clocks forward means we lose one hour of sleep, but you can be prepared for it.

Dr Doug McEvoy, an Australian sleep physician from the Sleep Health Foundation, says the best thing you can do is follow the sun.

“Over the next week you should get as much bright light exposure first thing in the morning to help reset the body clock. This may mean having breakfast on your patio or not wearing sunglasses on your way to work,” he says.

The time change will also mean that it may be more difficult for some to get to sleep at their usual time.

“Preparing for sleep is really important, no caffeine, tea or chocolate before bed. Get into a relaxed frame of mind before going to bed and keep iPad’s and televisions out of the bedroom.”

Interestingly, it is the 35 to 50 year old age groups that are the most vulnerable to the daylight saving shift due to their tendency to be “short sleepers”, he says.

“We must recognise that sleep is really important to health and safety,” says Dr McEvoy. “The statistics show that the accident rate goes up about ten per cent after we move our clocks forward.”

Daylight saving ends at 2am on the first Sunday of April when clocks are put back one hour.

You should really start preparing for daylight saving a few days ahead of the change.

Originally published as Daylight saving: Turn clocks forward one hour