Central European Time

Even if you get cheap electricity in Troon at night, my Lords? I started off, looking at this again, by going back to two excellent publications from the Policy Studies Institute—by Mayer Hillman, who has again been writing on it for years—which clearly set out the pros and cons of moving the clocks. What is interesting is the fact that in debating the Road Safety Bill quite recently we discovered a little more information about statistics and the Department for Transport’s view. In a 1996 paper, the Transport Road Research Laboratory confirmed that in experiments of the late 1960s—a long time ago now—there was a reduction of 230 in the number of road fatalities. In Committee on the Road Safety Bill on 8 June, I was pleased to see a quote from Tomorrow’s Roads: Safer for Everyone, 2000, the Government paper on roads. In case we have forgotten it, it stated:"““The conclusion was that this””—" the change of time—"““might save over 100 deaths per year and taken together with serious injuries save well over 400  . . . casualties””." It concludes:"““A saving of this magnitude is something we must take seriously””." If one attaches to those fatalities the value for preventable fatality the Government use for road and rail deaths, that is a saving of £150 million a year, which I suggest is well worth having. It is good to see that my noble friend Lord Sainsbury will respond tonight. When he answered a Starred Question on 4 April this year from the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, asking how many lives could be saved by moving to Central European time, he said:"““I am not certain whether it would have any impact””.—[Official Report, 4/4/05; col. 478.]" Now he knows what the impact would be, and I am sure that if he is asked that question again he might give a different answer.       With regard to the Road Safety Bill, I was pleased by the response of the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham, to an amendment seeking to achieve much the same as today’s debate. My noble friend said that the change in time would be a major contribution to road safety. It is good that he knows that. He then went on to say that road safety is not the only issue and that it was the Department of Trade and Industry’s responsibility, which is why my noble friend Lord Sainsbury is sitting on the Front Bench today, and will answer. Who is against this? The noble Viscount said there was a lot of interest in Scotland against it, but if one trawls press cuttings about this, which tend to be from early November every year, there is clearly debate. Some people are in favour of it and some are against. Professor David Begg, who until recently was chairman of the Commission for Integrated Transport, and comes from Edinburgh and Aberdeen, confirmed that this change would save 100 deaths and 350 serious injuries. He was criticised by one or two farmers, but then he pointed out that there are not many farmers whose cows stay outside in winter, and anyway the cows have a clock, and it is possible to have electric light. The debate goes on quite a lot further on that. I agree with the noble Viscount that from the business point of view it is extremely irritating being an hour behind the rest of Europe. I went to Brussels yesterday and had to get up at five o’clock in the morning to catch a Eurostar train, and did not get to my meeting until 10. At this time of year it is quite cold, but that is not the point. We are at a disadvantage compared with people coming here from the Continent, and that should be taken into account. Given that the PSI  concluded that, as the noble Viscount has said, opinion polls have found that a substantial majority of the population is in favour, not just from transport, but from industry, tourism, leisure and all organisations involved in trade, travel, communications and the provision of sport, recreation and cultural facilities, as well as bodies representing vulnerable social groups, including children, women and the elderly—I apologise for the length of that list—I have to ask my noble friend: who is against this? That is a pretty good list of people who are in favour of it. One hundred and fifty million pounds would be saved from reduced accidents every year. The Department for Transport states that that is not the only consideration, but, given those other results from these reports, I hope that the Minister will tell us where in the UK this enormous groundswell of opposition to a simple change is located and what are the Government’s reasons for preventing it.