Admiral logo

MultiCar Insurance

Combine cars on
one policy for
MultiCar discounts.

Start a quote

Find out more

Retrieve a quote

Single-Car Insurance

Great value insurance
crammed with
plenty of features.

Start a quote

Find out more

Retrieve a quote

Give us a call

Talk to a friendly
member of staff.

Single-Car Insurance

0844 543 4416

MultiCar Insurance

0844 848 4316

Back to Motoring news

Motoring news

RoSPA calls for lighter evenings campaign support

26/03/2010

A safety charity is canvassing support for what it calls a "life-saving change" to the British Summer Time (BST) system, ahead of the clocks going forward this weekend.

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) is drawing attention to its long-running campaign for a move to a so-called Single Double Summer Time (SDST). This would see clocks running two hours ahead of Greenwich Mean Time in summer, and a single hour ahead in winter.

Effectively, this would mean that mornings would be darker and evenings lighter throughout the whole year.

Under the standard BST system, clocks are set to go forward by one hour at 1am on Sunday, 28 March.

Acknowledging that it is time for the 60-year campaign to "step up a gear", RoSPA is seeking to drive support for its Lighter Evenings Campaign. It claims that adopting the measure would see road death totals slashed by around 80 per year, while serious injuries would also fall by more than 200 cases.

In December, the safety charity also claimed that its SDST concept would have "significant environmental benefits", a case it is reinforcing again.

Chief executive Tom Mullarkey said that the road safety benefits "have already been accepted at a national level".

"It’s now time to regain the momentum and press forward so our generation will be the one to achieve this life-saving change," he added.

A trial of a similar scheme between 1968 and 1971 found that, although there was an increase in morning casualties, the evening saw a substantially greater reduction in casualties.

Meanwhile, a South Yorkshire MP has suggested a new approach to the rush hour in London - banning vehicular traffic while commuters and schoolchildren make their morning journeys on foot, or by bicycle.

Rotherham MP Denis MacShane suggested the measure during Question Time in the House of Commons, apparently taking inspiration from a system in the Colombian capital of Bogata, which he said shuts its roads to vehicles every Sunday.

Mr MacShane told Environment Minister Jim Fitzpatrick that the measure would allow people to move around without their lungs being "clogged with the filthy fumes of our city", according to the Sheffield Telegraph.