§ Mr. Croninasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if, bearing in mind that Great Britain and France have between them four different time changes a year, he will take steps to ensure that the time changes occur at the same time.
§ Mr. Merlyn ReesI appreciate the difficulties caused by these time changes, but the period of summer time in France this422W year is six weeks shorter than in the United Kingdom and I would not wish to propose that we adopt the French dates.
The European Economic Community is considering a proposal that all member States should apply summer time for a common period running from about the beginning of April to mid-October. This would shorten our present period of summer time by four weeks and Parliament would need to be consulted before any change could be made.