Day light saving – British Summer time
Invented in 1905 day light saving was the idea of a Mr William Willet, a builder by trade he was a keen golfer who disliked having to cut short he rounds of golf at dusk. Whilst visiting London one summer’s morning he noticed that many Londoners in his opinion were still asleep during what he classed as the best time of the day. However it wasn’t until 1907 that he formally proposed DST. He initially campaigned to advance clocks by 80 minutes, by 4 moves of 20 minutes at the beginning of the spring and summer. It attracted many supporters including Churchill, Balfour and Edward VII. In fact Edward had already been using his own DST at Sandringham for a number of years. Yet it wasn’t until the 16th of May 1914 that the first DST was introduced in the United Kingdom.
Since then DST has changed a number of times including during the two world wars where various DST were used including a period of double Sumer Time during WW2. Today DST starts on the last Sunday of March and finishes on the last Sunday of October in line with the changes made to DST to bring the UK inline with Europe on when the clocks change.
There has been much talk over that last few years on whether the UK should continue to use DST. Please vote in my poll in the forum (Ask the Community BartonleClayOnline) on whether any changes should be made to the system.
