Reader's solution for daylight saving debate

LETTER: One Toowoomba resident to solve debates over introducing daylight saving time in Queensland.

"I AM a Marxist, of the Groucho variety." As that comedic anarchist once said, "Whatever it is, I'm against it".

That certainly applies to that irritating concept called daylight saving. It should not be adopted in Queensland as it puts hens off their laying, the cows off their milking, fades the curtains and worst of all puts roosters' crowing schedule out of kilter.

Jokes aside, my suggestion would be to leave the clocks in Queensland alone when the southern states change but if a business owner in Coolangatta prefers the alternate then let him open his doors at 8am instead of 9am and close them at 4pm instead of 5pm hours. Coolangatta businesses that wish to link with Tweed Heads could choose to adopt this idea.

My suggestion would be for the whole world to permanently adopt Greenwich Mean Time. Brisbane is 10 hours ahead of GMT, hence noon at Greenwich (UK) is always 8pm here.

Establish GMT 1200 as the hinge and set up the world's clocks from there. By that system it would not matter what the clock face said in Brisbane ... an aircraft flying in from Singapore would take a set number of hours to get here from there, whether it was dark or light - what the hands on the terminal clock may indicate would be im-material.

If the daylight saving concept was removed then "when the dust settled" all would fall into a concise and un-changing pattern. Everyone would always know what the time was in another country. It's a bit Fascist in thinking but also eminently sensible.

If I had a friend in Edinburgh I would always know if my friend was up and about or in deepest slumber at night. If I knew it was constantly 10pm in the UK when it was noon here I would not have to think it through whether someone was awake or not.

If he wanted to speak to me at his 9am, when he called it would be my 7pm and the same equations would apply for Berlin, Tokyo or where ever else phone calls were a regular occurrence.

ROGER E. DESHON, Toowoomba
 

Originally published as Reader's solution for daylight saving debate