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EU To Stop Changing the Clocks in October 2019 (dw.com)
European Commissioner for Transport Violeta Bulc last week announced that the EU will stop the twice-yearly changing of clocks across the continent in October 2019. From a report: The practice, which was used as a means to conserve energy during the World Wars as well as the oil crises of the 1970s, became law across the bloc in 1996. All EU countries are required to move forward by an hour on the last Sunday of March and back by an hour on the final Sunday in October. Bulc said EU member states would have until April 2019 to decide whether they would permanently remain on summer or winter time. [...] "In order to maintain a harmonised approach we are encouraging consultations at national levels to ensure a coordinated approach of all member states," Bulc said.
The decision to tackle the issue was prompted after the Commission launched an online survey. Some 4.6 million Europeans answered the survey -- three million of those respondents were from Germany -- with 80 percent of them voting to scrap the practice .
DST is a waste of time. Now it is time for the U.S. to do the same.
From what I've heard, the problem in Britain is that almost everyone prefers BST to GMT, but there's an equally-strong nostalgic draw to being on GMT for at least a few months per year... an enduring reminder that Britain was once the literal center and reference point of the civilized world, and everyone *else* defined their local time relative to London's time.
I suspect France will have a similar national dilemma. It didn't get to name GMT, but it DID get to name UTC (or at least, SI did). Europe's geopolitical center might have shifted eastward after Germany reunified and the EU grew... but as long as France gets to have UTC for a few months per year, it can still feel smugly superior and regard itself as the world's timekeeping reference point. Moving to CET year-round would be yet another psychological concession that continental Europe no longer revolves around Paris.
Predictions:
1. France will stick with UTC for the sake of national pride initially, decide it hates early sunsets, and join the rest of Europe in UTC+1 within a couple of years.
2. Britain will come up with a solution worthy of a Terry Pratchett novel... UTC+1 year-round, except on Boxing Day. On Boxing Day, clocks will be turned back an hour sometime early in the morning, solar noon will occur at 12:00 GMT somewhere in Britain (often in London, occasionally near the site of the Greenwich Observatory itself (or at least, somewhere above its parking lot, since the actual meridian is a few hundred feet away from the "ceremonial" meridian's painted line), then clocks will skip from 22:59:59 GMT to 00:00:00 UTC+1, ensuring that the madness & confusion persist for only a single calendar day.
The first year, everyone will think it's cute in the days leading up to it, the day itself will end with thousands of people missing flights and trains due to mass confusion about whether or not the time change is a joke, and a few weeks later Parliament will quietly pass a law making Britain UTC+1 year-round, except for the literal sites of the Greenwich Observatory and Stonehenge (which will be GMT year-round... preserving the symbolism, while sparing 99.999% of Britain's population from having to deal with its consequences).