Clocks back as NZ farewells Summer '09
01 Apr 2009
This weekend New Zealand takes an official step towards winter 2009 when clocks are turned back an hour as the country says goodbye to daylight saving.
During one of the best summers on record, New Zealanders have revelled in golden weather and long hours of daylight since summer-time came into effect last year on 28 September.
But this Sunday morning (5.04.09) 3am will revert to 2am as the country returns to New Zealand Mean Time.
Mixed reaction
The end to daylight saving is met with mixed sentiments.
While the rural community and early bird commuters welcome an end to heading off to work in the dark, sports people and leisure seekers mourn the shorter days and lack of evenings for outdoor activities.
Traditionally autumn is one of New Zealand’s most attractive and pleasant seasons for travel. Settled weather and slightly cooler temperatures mixed with dramatic autumnal colours and clear blue skies make this time of year particularly appealing to tourists.
Festivals & fixtures
It’s also an ideal season to enjoy the wide variety of events staged throughout the country, and the coming months are packed with festivals and fixtures celebrating the country’s best in every aspect of wine, food, music, sport, culture and art.
Autumn 2009 highlights
Background: Daylight saving
Daylight saving has been observed in New Zealand under the current regime since 2006 when public debate led to a review and a petition signed by 42,000 people was presented to Parliament.
In April 2007, the Minister of Internal Affairs extended daylight saving to run from the last Sunday in September to the first Sunday in April.
The idea of daylight saving was first mooted in New Zealand by entomologist and astronomer George Hudson as early as 1895.
Hudson presented a paper to the Wellington Philosophical Society advocating for seasonal time adjustment but society members ridiculed his idea.
It was not until 1909 that the issue was raised again, when MP Sir Thomas Sidey introduced a member’s Bill arguing for advancing clocks by one hour during summer to gain an extra hour of daylight.
Sidey’s Bill was rejected the first time round, but he persisted by reintroducing his Bill every year for the next 20 years. It almost became law in 1915, and again in 1926 when it was passed by the House of Representatives, but then rejected by the Legislative Council (New Zealand’s upper House of Parliament until 1951).
During the second reading of his Summer Time Bill in 1926, Sidey argued:
The extra hour of daylight after working-hours during the summer months is of especial value to indoor workers and the community as a whole as it gives one additional hour for recreation of all kinds, whether playing games or working in garden plots … one cannot overlook the economic advantages that will also accrue. There will be a saving in the consumption of artificial light.
Much of the debate in the House of Representatives centred on the impact on people in rural areas and women in particular. Opponents of the Bill commented that:
[Summer Time] will bring no happiness to the women of New Zealand who live in the backblocks. [the Bill] does not make the case for now requiring the wife of the working-man to get up an hour earlier in order to get her husband away to his work.
In 1927 Sidey was successful when the Summer Time Act authorised the advancement of clocks by one hour between 6 November 1927 and 4 March 1928, but this only lasted a year and was later changed to just half an hour.
The period of observation fluctuated for many years, and it wasn’t until 1974 that The Time Act provided that the Governor-General could declare, by Order in Council, a period of ‘Daylight Time’.
It is now fixed as a one-hour advance on New Zealand Standard Time, and in the case of the Chatham Islands, is at one hour forty-five minutes ahead of New Zealand Standard Time.
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