Energy Saving (Daylight) Bill

That is the other side of the coin, and we have to balance two different arguments. There is a tendency, of course, to extend the school day at both ends. In the morning, for example, children may go to school early to attend a breakfast club, and in the evening they may take part in after-school activities, or there may be arrangements in place so that their parents can collect them after finishing work. The school day has changed so that children less often go home at the hour mentioned by the hon. Gentleman. Similarly, they more often go to school while it is still dark in the morning. We cannot ignore the problems that the changes would cause, especially in rural areas. Many of my constituents’ children and children in other rural constituencies wait for school buses at the end of farm roads and at crossroads on dark mornings. Some of them are dropped off from one form of transport only to wait for another. Some children will be taken to primary school, while the middle school children are dropped off at a bus stop to wait for a bus to take them to their school. Expecting them to wait for transport on more cold dark mornings is both an imposition and a danger—and that danger extends beyond road safety concerns. Pupils who are over 16 have to pay £360 each for the privilege of travelling to school by bus in Northumberland, which is an atrociously high charge. As I travel around my constituency in the early morning between 8 and 9 am, I see many children waiting for buses at farm road ends and at crossroads. Under the proposals, they would far more often have to do so in the dark. The change would therefore pose a serious problem in significant parts of the country. I am even more worried, however, about the potential for two, or even three or four, time zones under the Bill, as that would be extremely difficult to cope with in border areas. Those of us who live on the English side of the border would not have a say or a vote on the matter if Scotland decided, for good reasons of its own, that it did not wish to make such a change, but we would be landed with consequences. We would not have the choice that the Scots would be offered in their Parliament about whether the new arrangements would suit our part of the country.