Should England and Wales move to European time?

[kurabrhm]

Whereas Scotland would remain in the old UK time!
Sounds cool to me! So the next time I go to Paris, I won't have to move my watch forward 1 hour!!

 

[Holyjoe]

no - i don't think we should.

wouldn't the mornings end up darker still ?

 

[tomwakefield]

Wouldn't that mean that GMT would be at GMT +1?

Or we could move every european country back one hour.

(I love these moving smilies! )

 

[Steve_SandbachBaptist_UK]

No way! Keep it as it is. And scotland having different time to England and Wales would be just daft.

Steve

 

[Holyjoe]

oh brilliant - perfect word

daft

 

[sunshinejennii]

[pong]daft daft daft!!!! [/pong]

 

[kurabrhm]

u may say that its daft but they're considering it.

the people who think up these things are little green goblins who live in a small bunker beneath the Greenwich dome in London. They also have branches underneath Big Ben and the millenium wheel apparently. NICE!

Those crazy whackos!
they just love having their watch perfectly synchronized to GMT.

 

[Rabidone]

I'm all for sychronisation with European time. It would mean less resetting of clocks. But what is more important is to leave the time the same all year round. I'm fed up of having jet lag twice a year.

It's madness to waste tens of thousands of man hours each year, due to people having to set a multitude of clocks around the house. It's pure madness. Life is too short.

 

[Rabidone]

no - i don't think we should.

wouldn't the mornings end up darker still ?

Not if you got up an hour later.

No way! Keep it as it is. And scotland having different time to England and Wales would be just daft.

Steve

No more daft than having the UK and France on different times.

 

[kurabrhm]

Not if you got up an hour later.


No more daft than having the UK and France on different times.

That's an interesting point about the UK and France in different time zones. I think its ridiculous!
I mean it was only last July that I was flying from Paris Charles De Gaulle airport to Southampton when I noticed how easy and quick the journey is. I didn;t even notice flying over Northern France and then before you know it you're flying over the beautiful English channel and then poor old Portsmouth and then (this is the wierdest thing), it seemed as if Portsmouth and Southampton merged together. It was almost as if they were both one city! I coudn't spot the 30 mile or so distance between the two cities.

 

[Steve_SandbachBaptist_UK]

Not if you got up an hour later.


No more daft than having the UK and France on different times.

I disagree because France is not in the UK and Scotland is.

Steve

 

[Cjwinnit]

No more daft than having the UK and France on different times.

In all honesty, France runs through the Greenwich meridien and should really be on GMT/BST time. Why Spain is on Central European Time is beyond me, it's almost a thousand miles away from central europe..

Besides, if we changed, would Ireland? To have Britain and Ireland in seperate timezones seems even sillier..

 

[kurabrhm]

In all honesty, France runs through the Greenwich meridien and should really be on GMT/BST time. Why Spain is on Central European Time is beyond me, it's almost a thousand miles away from central europe..

Besides, if we changed, would Ireland? To have Britain and Ireland in seperate timezones seems even sillier..

No Ireland would not change apparently. It would be just England and Wales moving to European time. I've heard rumours that Wales is apparently kicking and screaming at the thought of having to follow the English yet again whilst the Scots get away!
But its probably only a matter of time before the Bonnie Prince Charlie decides to hang himself or something at Tower Bridge and Scotland joins with England and Wales in club Europa.
Scotland and Ireland have been left out probably because the government don't plan on giving any Scottish or Irish cities the "priviliged title" of "European cultural capital of the year"!!! Or perhaps because Sean Connery (sigh) has made a personal protest against the idea!

 

[Rabidone]

I disagree because France is not in the UK and Scotland is.

Steve

However since the European court of justice became the final court of appeal after the Palace of Westminster, we are all part of the European superstate, France has to be viewed at least equaly with wales when considering which country England should assiciate with most (especially with Wales becoming more self governed and using their own language more). I wouldn't be surprised to find England does more trade with france than with Wales, and trade is probably the best reason to sychronize the clocks.

Imagine if each county/city in the UK was still running on it's own time as they used to do before the railways made travel faster and connected the cities together. That would be absolute madness. Today with the advent of rapid air travel, I see the time differences between the countries in the European Community as equally stupid.

 

[Cjwinnit]

Today with the advent of rapid air travel, I see the time differences between the countries in the European Community as equally stupid.

I bet you would be surprised that the US has 5 different timezones in the continental 48 states...

I still don't quite get this. Why, when GMT is the timezone everyone else in the world measures against, should we change being in the world's time yardstick?

In fact, if you look at this map:

http://www.worldtimezone.com/index24.html

you may care to note that the UK, Ireland, Portugal, Iceland and large swathes of western Africa are on our time.

Another point: If you care to look carefully at the map, you will see why GMT + 1 is called CET (Central European Time). It's for Central Europe. France, Spain, Belguim, the Netherlands and Luxemburg are in fact in Western Europe and are also west of 7* 30' W, so should be on GMT anyway.

The "Trade with France" thing: Two thoughts:

1/ If Spain and the Benelux countries were to have the geographically correct timezone (GMT) France's biggest export partner in terms of timezone would then be GMT:

Export partners of France: Germany (CET) 14.9%, Spain (CET, should be GMT) 9.6%, UK 9.4% (GMT) , Italy (CET) 9.3%, Belgium 7.2% (CET, should be GMT), US 6.8% (2003 est.)

2/ In France this is not an economic issue, it will be a political one. France would love to have moved us from GMT. We'd be seen to kowtow to France. Call me a little Englander but I don't want that to happen.