Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-12-11-Speech-1-077"
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"en.20001211.4.1-077"2
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"Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the proposal for a directive on summer time arrangements that we are examining today is a good proposal. It is a proposal based on extensive research carried out at the request of the Commission. The results of that research are interesting in that they contradict certain generally accepted ideas.
First, most sectors of the economy have now incorporated the principle of summer time. What is more, some socio-economic sectors, particularly IT, transport, telecommunications and tourism, have asked for the change to summer time to become permanent. In fact, time is a basic datum which these sectors need to incorporate into their products and services. That means they need to know about the arrangements for changing to summer time in all the Member States in advance.
Secondly, certain assumed negative effects have clearly not materialised. Thus, in terms of health, any problems experienced are of short duration and fully reversible. Nor do the results of the survey indicate any negative effects on animal biorhythms or working conditions on farms.
On the other hand, the research reveals other, less expected, implications. Summer time seems to be in step with the way lifestyles are developing in our societies, due in particular to later working hours, and the extension of hours for shops, public services and transport. The extra hour of daylight provided by moving to summer time is particularly beneficial in the tourism and leisure sector, where increases in business directly linked to lighter and longer evenings have been recorded. Summer time definitely seems to go hand-in-hand with better quality of life, as the positive effects of the summer time period are far more significant than the transitional problems linked to the change itself.
The European Parliament has only one amendment to the initial proposal from the European Commission. It calls for a report every five years on the incidence of the arrangements under the Summer Time Directive. If these reports show that the summer time arrangements need to be altered, the Commission could then bring forward appropriate proposals. The first report will be drafted by 30 April 2007, at the latest. I do not think this amendment runs counter to the aim of the Commission’s proposal. It will facilitate monitoring of the implementation of the time change without undermining the principle.
At the end of the day we cannot but welcome the Commission’s proposal to make the change to summer time a permanent instrument of European policy by finally establishing the summer time arrangements for an unlimited period."@en1
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