Do we still need daylight saving time? Yahoo readers have their say
Yahoo UK's poll of the week lets you vote and indicate your strength of feeling on one of the week's hot topics. After the poll closes, we'll publish and analyse the results each Friday, giving readers the chance to see how polarising a topic has become and if their view chimes with other Yahoo UK readers.
Calls for Britain to learn 'wartime lessons' by moving the clocks forward by two hours during the summer months were rejected by the government this week.
Labour MP Alex Mayer pressed the case for double British Summer Time (BST), dubbed 'Churchill Time', as a way of reducing energy usage, improving mental health and potentially reducing road accidents.
Business minister Justin Madders acknowledged there are 'a number of benefits' to the proposal, which was adopted during the Second World War, but said the existing daylight saving approach provides 'optimal use of the available daylight across the UK'.
It comes as clocks will go forward one hour on Sunday to provide more daylight in the evenings during what is known as British Summer Time.
They then go back one hour at 2am on the last Sunday in October, with the next change due on 26 October.
Daylight saving takes place in about 70 countries around the world, with its merits hotly contested.
British Summer Time started in 1916, during the depths of the First World War, a month after Germany brought in daylight saving measures to reduce its industrial demand for coal.
After the war, the move became permanent and since then the UK has changed its clocks to reflect the desire to have lighter evenings in the summer months for citizens to enjoy their leisure.
However, there have been repeated calls to scrap it. Some have argued the twice-yearly clock changes harms the nation's sleep patterns. Others say scrapping it would boost tourism, cut the number of roads accidents and reduce energy use.
In our poll earlier this week, Yahoo News UK asked readers if we still need daylight saving hours in the UK. It received 1,988 votes and showed 70% think not.
The poll's Have Your Say feature attracted some passionate comments, such as from Elizabeth T, from County Durham, who said: "No we do not [still need daylight saving]. My concern is in the autumn when children are walking home tired after a busy school day and schools finish at a time when the light is fading. Likely there will be more accidents."
Similarly Pete J, from Lancashire, said: "Since the actual number of daylight hours is unaffected by changing the clocks, I feel that in winter shunting the daylight period towards the evening is advantageous - giving the impression that the day is longer. Therefore I think that British Summer Time should be adopted for the whole year and renamed British Standard Time."
"Shunting the daylight period towards the evening in winter is advantageous"
On the other hand, Ron O, from Huddersfield, said: "Leave things as they are. [Without daylight saving] in winter it will be darker for longer in the morning while people are going about their daily business." He suggested there would be an increase in road accidents and pedestrian casualties.
But Barabar T, from Mold, said: "I have a very strong body clock which runs on GMT all year round, as does my dogs. I find it far too disruptive to my body system and it can make me feel quite unwell."
Yahoo News UK readers were also asked, on a scale of one to 10, how much extra daylight in the evenings affects their happiness...
This poll received 927 votes with the most common vote being 10 (316, making up 34% of votes cast) and an average strength-of-feeling score of 8.41, showing most readers will welcome the longer evenings once the clocks move forward this weekend.
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