DAYLIGHT SAVING

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 August 1928, Page 6

DAYLIGHT SAVING

EXPERIENCES IN CANADA

(Special to “Star.”)

AUCKLAND, August 11.

While the question of daylight saving is being freely discussed in New Zealand, it is of interest to learn how the method works in other parts of the Empire. One of the first of the Dominions to follow the lead of Britain in adopting daylight saving, as a war time measure was Canada, and in the years that followed, the method has operated in Canadian cities each summer.

When interviewed, the Canadian Trade Commissioner (Mr. C. M. Croft) said that daylight saving in his country was not a political measure. In a general way it operated in cities, but not in the country, and each district had the right to decide whether or not it would depart from the standard between the months of May and September.

Mr. Croft said that Vancouver, this year, decided to adhere to standard time, in preference to daylight saving time. When one goes to the city railways station in Canada during the summer, one usually sees an extra hand on each clock, with the direction that the red hand denotes* daylight saving time. This is for the information of the public, and not for the running of train's. Railway time tables operate on standard time. In any case the regularity of time is a far more complicated business in Canada than in New Zealand. This is so for geographical reasons. When “standard” indicates 7 a.m. in Vancouver, the time at Halifax on the other side of the Continent is high noon. In the course of the train journey from West to East, there are five points at which it is usual for passengers to put their watches an hour on. On the return journey, of course, the clocks go back. New Zealanders are fortunate in that geographical conditions do not call for so much clock changing here. It is a question of keeping to standard time or in summer adopting daylight saving hours.

“So far as Canada is concerned,” said Mr. Croft, “it would seem that the people in the cities have appreciated the extra hour of daylight in the summer months, and that farmers and others living in the country have preferred to continue standard time.