KEY POINTS:
As the debate about extending daylight savings continues, a Herald editorial has argued that such a move has a wealth of popular support. "Even the country's farmers, traditionally died-in-the-wool opponents, are relatively comfortable with the proposed change. A regulatory amendment is all that is required for extended daylight saving next summer. On this issue, Mr Barker need not look far to see the light."
This forum debate has now closed. Here is a selection of your views on the topic.
Gaye
I have been late in replying but do feel strongly about the possible extended hours of daylight saving. My argument is that it is against the natural rhythm of nature, should the hours extend. Officially Autumn starts on the 1 March and already leaves are falling, the weather has got decidedly cooler in the mornings,and you can see people donning cardigans, jackets and coats. I have not researched this matter, but feel the bio-rhythms of humans also is affected. Of my observations with daylight saving, people yawn and are quite often irritable until they become accustomed to the daylight saving hour and of my personal experience, I am a much happier person when I can return to the old hours of Autumn/winter. 30,000 signatures do not represent our population of 4 million or so, and feel this needs to be researched into the effects both on humans, productivity, geographically, natural evolution and the farming community.
I first heard of extended hours last summer, and one reason put forward was of more tourist dollars in the Nelson area. Do we really need to upset the majority for the minority and how do the elderly and the young children cope or more importantly their careers? Like the stadium on the Auckland waterfront fiasco, I think this needs to be looked into more and not thrust upon us so suddenly.
Vincent Du Burgess
I am in favour of increasing daylight saving. The best weather comes towards the end of summer and into autumn. Do not let the recent hiccup of bad weather put us off.
Leanne
I vote in favour of extending daylight savings. I love the long summer evenings. I am not a morning person and I would rather use the mornings to focus on work (getting the kids ready, housework and getting off to work), and then use the evenings to relax. I would rather my light was in my down time and not in my rush out the door time, that way I get to enjoy it.
Margaret Davies
I would like Daylight Saving extended until the end of March. I am more than happy for Daylight Saving to start at the beginning of October.
Al
Just read the Heralds latest selection of views and it sounds like they are mainly coming from the sad minority of whiners intent on shooting down anything positive.I am amongst the 80 per cent silent majority who say "Let there be light! Extend Daylight Saving!"
Kane
I suspect the people who want to extend daylight savings are the same people who are known to complain about cyclists riding on the road and general inconvenience. Personally (and it is the same for the majority of cyclists) I like to get up early and beat the traffic onto the roads so I can cycle in relative safety, but the lack of lights in the mornings often does not make this possible. It is not easy to do a cycle after work either because traffic tends to persist until it is dark again. Please do us a favor and make up your minds, do you want more cyclists on the road while you are traveling to and from work? Or do you just want everyone to give up keeping fit and do what you inevitably causing increased health costs, which you will complain about too! Wake up (one hour earlier)!
Toni
Personally I love daylight savings - everything about it. I love looking forward to it on those cold winter days, I love being able to hang the washing out when I get home from work, I love that my partner can mow the lawns when he gets home from work. I love being able to enjoy the weekends because all the jobs got done during the week, and I love the good old kiwi BBQs that wouldnt feel quite right if the sun went down before 8.00pm. And, I also love getting up when its dark, I am always too sleepy to be faced straight away with bright sunlight, I love waking up with it.Ah well, you can never please everyone, I can just imagine winter when we will all be complaining of the cold and wondering why it gets dark so damn early?
Trish
Get rid of daylight savings, after all what are you going to do with the extra light - export it?
Frank Kai Fong
Surely to extend Daylight Saving time should require more than 35,000 petition signers to change something affects 4 million odd other people as well. Let democracy rule. A referendum would be the only fair way to make that decision. I absolutely hate getting out of bed to find that it's still as dark as when I went to bed. Parents also find it hard to settle kiddies down at night when its still so light.
Derwood
Its pissing down with rain, snow is forecast the winds howling its pitch black in the morning. Wow, lets extend daylight saving.
Averill Young
I am one of thousands of workers who at present (because of daylight saving) have to get up in the dark. Although I cannot talk for the other
several thousand, I am sure they like me would prefer to rise in the
daylight. We are spending more dollars on energy, (just check the lights on in the neighbourhood before dawn); on fuel (we all have to switch on the car headlights), and our body clocks have to adjust twice a day. I get up in the dark and I go to bed in the daylight in order to get up again in the dark. How good is that? Get rid of daylight saving.
Lawrence
I reckon we should either stay in standard time or daylight time. Then there is no need to change clocks forward or backwards, or have any excuse your up an hr late for work!
Daniel Palenski
No more daylight savings. Everyone who supports it, dont have to get up at 7am no more.
Harry Johnston
Let us get rid of daylight savings. When the clocks change it messes up everyone's routine, especially children, and it is horrible to have to wake up when it is still pitch black outside, and even worse to walk to the bus stop in darkness. However, under no circumstances should any change be made without at least two years notice so computer systems can be updated beforehand. The recent change in the US, made with only a few months notice, has caused all sorts of problems, worries and unnecessary expense.
Nancy Jo Gross
I realize that some people will not understand this or feel it is a valid reason. They either do not have children or are not a kid at heart. Changing daylight savings to the first Sunday in November will not work. Halloween is a few days before and changing in October made is possible for children to go out earlier. Now they will have to wait til later in the evening, making it harder on the little ones. Adults will get annoyed because the older children will now stay out later, dinging those bells late into the evening. Some things are better left alone. Thank you for letting me vent.
Arda van Kuyk
Perhaps I am in the minority but I like winter more for the fact that it is lighter in the morning and with children it is easier to start the day..in the summer trying to convince them it is bedtime other than with thick covers over the windows. We do get there with basically saying it is 7pm and it is time (for both 8 and 4 year olds). I like winter and summer and do not mind the colder months or the rain. Neither do our kids. A pair of gumboots and good coat and they are still outside.
Stanley Kivell
So 35,000 people want extra daylight saving . That is only 1.66 per cent voting for it. I go with the 98.34 per cent who say no.
Gordon Anderson
Daylight Savings Time should be done away with altogether. It benefits no one while at the same time creates a lot of headaches because of all the clocks that have to be reset twice a year. I live in Canada and the province of Saskachewan does not recognise Dalight Savings Time. We all could learn from them.
Bren
Abolish it altogether. There is no need to mess up our body clocks so terribly twice a year. Anyone with some sense would realise it's far easier to change work shift times / school times twice a year than
to change the entire time system! The implementation would amount to a simple, "Hey Joe, you're working the 9-5 not the 8-4 now". It is an outdated system, thought up in the dark ages. Instead of a one-sided petition making up the government's mind, how about a survey on whether to change the dates, leave it, or abolish it? How many people actually enjoy the sunshine? Take a survey of people on the beaches vs the number of people indoors on the internet with artificial light.
Jim Donald
I do not think we should have daylight saving at all. Certainly it should never be extended - rather abolished once and for all. The notion that daylight savings confers benefits is typical of the prevailing view these days that it is possible to ride roughshod over nature and the natural order of things with no consequences.Being forced to start the day artificially one hour earlier actually induces a mild case of jet-lag on the whole population, whether the ignorant proponents of Daylight Saving recognise it or not. I believe that this causes deleterious health effects; unrecognised for the moment but which will become apparent over time, unless daylight saving is totally abolished. I am looking forward with a passion to March 18th. when we can once again be in tune with the natural seasons. If this cessation date were to be extended a further 3 weeks to (say) the 8th. of April sunrise would then be occurring at 7.41 am., whereas we are already having to endure a sunrise at 7.22 am. on March 17th. The idea that we can then all happily frolic in an extra hour of daylight at the end of the day is ridiculous because we are, whether we realise it or not, so adversely affected by the correspondingly earlier start at the beginning of the day. The proposition of daylight savings is promoted as a populist cause by politicians upon a generally gullible public because they cynically see political mileage in the idea. The sooner we all wake up (an hour later!!) and recognise the harm it is causing all of us and the motives behind it the better. Where is the petition to give expression to the opponents of Daylight Saving? It does not exist because it does not suit the political agenda.
Emma
If we are looking at Americas example of changing our DST regime, I would hope we also learn from their example in planning for the change in advance. If this bill is rushed through, there are going to be severe problems in every industry using computers - which is pretty much every industry, these days. I work in IT, and have friends overseas, some of whom have had to spend several weeks ensuring their systems will roll over to DST successfully, and then patching up issues after the change. Not a pretty sight.
Kirstie
I just can not see the logic of extending daylight savings beyond 26 weeks of the year. That is spring equinox to autumn equinox. If we want longer evenings surely starting work and school earlier in the morning would make more sense. Clock time, a man made concept is in theory set so that noon equals the suns zenith,the working day is just numbers on the clock. The electricity saving argument just does not stack up when you take into account that at 6 o'clock in the morning every member of this household is up and one is already on the way to work in spite of the lack of daylight at that hour this time of year.
Margot Jassat
I think daylight saving should be extended because of very short summer we have. New Zealanders being outdoor people must take advantage of the extra daylight hours. How many hours in Winter do we spend indoors or more so, inactive. Lets get fit, and stay healthy by extending those lovely summer evenings.
Johnny the fox
Well, all I can is that since being here in NZ, living and working, is that a lot of people of working age seem to spend most of their time at work for relatively little (median value) pay, with very few holidays (the annual Christmas shutdown often determined by employer), with very family unfriendly shift patterns (1 weekend off in 8!), & 3-4 weeks holiday a year; that having darker evenings will make very little difference to those people anyway. I do not think Kiwis have much choice about being workaholics. A friend was telling me here thats it not so long ago that 2 weeks annual leave was common?? Kind of goes hand in hand really - deprive the masses of evening sunlight so may as well stay at work.
Raj Subramanian
You may all know that a year is not perfect 365 days x 24 hours. Though we created a leap year to accommodate the extra quarter day a year x 4 years, we still have imperfect calendars. El Nino, climate changes, hole and depletion of Ozone Layer. global warming, changes in sun spots: scientists say all these things push the seasons forward which could be felt every year. We have no mechanism to globally adjust our calendars to suit the changing seasons.
Luckily we have our own sunlight saving system. It seems we accepted the reality and adjusted our clocks by an hour for those many weeks, probably our bodies and minds felt the changes. I think 3 to 4 week extension of sunlight saving addresses the reality more appropriately.
Stuart McDougall
I would like to add my vote to increasing the length of daylight saving.
Joanne Robertson
I am a morning person and can not wait for day light saving to end so it can be light in the mornings again.
Judy Weston
I would like it extended this end but not start until Labour weekend in October. Our seasons appear to have changed and it can be still quite dark and cold beginning of October. This not only upsets the routine of babies, toddlers, parents as well as animals so Labour weekend is early enough to start daylight savings.
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