The Victorian Premier, Jeff Kennett, wants to extend daylight saving from its present four months to just shy of six months _ from the first weekend in October to the last weekend in March. The main reason he has given is social _ the running of the grand prix and the various autumn festivals. The ACT has similar autumn festivals and it, too, would concur with Mr Kennett’s concerns.
Mr Fahey, on the other hand, has been unmoved by the social arguments. The only thing that has moved him from intractable support for the present four month-period has been a business argument. The Melbourne Stock Exchange would get an hour’s jump on Sydney for two months of the year.
Daylight saving was shortened to the present four months by NSW three years ago and the ACT, Victoria and South Australia felt they had to fall into line. Tasmania, girt by sea, stayed with the six months. Now Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania have called for a six-month and want NSW to follow.
Clearly, it is in the best economic interest of the nation if Sydney and Melbourne are always in the same time zone. It makes sense for the whole nation to move to daylight saving as one for a fixed period. The great bulk of the population in the cities would prefer a longer rather than shorter period of daylight saving.
On the economic and democratic argument it would make sense if NSW, Victoria, the ACT, South Australia and Tasmania moved as one with daylight saving from early October to later March. It would make even better sense if the other states and Territories joined them.
However, the needs of the people in the northern and western parts of the various states should not be ignored. While business and legal requirements suggest it makes good sense for business to run with a national summer time, there is room for some compromise outside the Sydney-Melbourne-Canberra-Adelaide axis. There is no reason why individual schools in say, Tibooburra or other remote towns in the west could not start their school day in summer and hour later (according to official time). Community meetings, too, could be set later. Indeed, rural areas are less tied to the clock and more to the sun and therefore can move activities more readily.
If Queensland and Western Australia are too intransigent to adopt summer time on a national approach, perhaps as a second-best solution they could have two time zones so that at least Perth and region and Brisbane and region move with the nation. There is perhaps a case for the Northern Territory to go it alone.
However, it would be plainly idiotic for NSW to have a different summer period from Victoria, Tasmania and South Australia. In the name of convenience, energy savings and economics, the Premiers should take a national approach to daylight saving and put aside the petty parochialism being peddled by the National Party in the far west of NSW. By deferring the decision, Mr Fahey will get time to work them around.