Why does RoSPA campaign for Single/Double British Summertime?
In the UK, we follow Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) from October to March and British Summer Time (BST) which is GMT + 1 hour from March to October. Most of Europe is one hour ahead of GMT in winter and two hours ahead of GMT in summer – always one hour ahead of the UK. One of the consequences of the UK’s system is that more people are killed and injured on the road because of darker evenings in the autumn and winter than would be if we adopted Single/Double British Summertime (SDST). Changing to SDST would mean that during winter, time would be GMT + 1 hour and during summer, time would be GMT + 2 hours. This would create lighter evenings all year round and result in fewer people being killed and injured in road accidents. It would also bring significant environmental, economic and health benefits, the latter being particularly relevant to the concerns about obesity and public health. During the week, casualty rates peak at 8am and 5pm for adults and 8am and 3.30pm for children, with the a
