It’s that time of year again when the season is changing and it’s time to shift the clocks forward by an hour. On the 25th of March at 2am the clocks moved forward by an hour – so most of us would have been fast asleep when this happened.

When the clocks move like this, we are moving from what is called Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) to British Summer Time (BST) – also known as daylight saving time (DST) or GMT + 1. The idea to first change the clocks was from Benjamin Franklin – an American Politician and inventor. He suggested that if people got up earlier when it was lighter than it would save on candles.

But this concept only arrived in the UK after Coldplay singer Chris Martin’s great- great- grandfather, William Willett (who was a builder) thought it was a good idea too.

Willett was born in Farnham, Surrey but lived most of his life in Chislehurst, Kent. It was said that one early Summer morning after riding his horse in Petts Wood, he noticed how many blinds were still down and that is when his idea for Daylight Saving Time first occurred.

After that his life had been dedicated to DST, he even released his own pamphlet in 1907 called ‘The Waste of Daylight’ encouraging people to get out of bed earlier. He also did some vicious campaigning that got him noticed by a few politicians and even Winston Churchill for a while. In 1908, the government discussed the idea of moving the clocks backwards and forwards but many people disliked the idea, so no one took action and it wasn’t made a law.

After a lifetime dedicated to convincing people that DST was a good idea, it was only introduced to the UK in 1916 – a year after he died. (He is now remembered by a memorial sundial in Petts Wood which is always set on Daylight Saving Time).

As a matter of fact, it was actually first introduced by the Germans in WWI, just before the UK did it and during WWII the UK used what was called the ‘British Double Summer Time’ (BDST), when the clocks were ahead by one hour during the Summer however this didn’t last very long.

Now all the clocks in the UK move forward by an hour on the last Sunday of March and move back again on the last Sunday of October and moving clocks like this is done in some countries across the world as they believe it is better for saving energy, reducing traffic accidents and making the best use of natural daylight.

However some countries don’t shift clocks as they in fact believe that it actually uses more energy, makes it darker for when children go to school (which can be dangerous) and it is bad for our health.

What do you think?

“It’s a good idea for making the most use of daylight and saving energy, but I am annoyed now that I have to get out of bed earlier” – Ghazala Butt.

Raheela Butt, Farringtons School