LETS GO IT ALONE ON DAYLIGHT SAVING WITH GCT

It’s time we caught up with the real world and wound our clocks forward – and stuff the rest of Queensland, as they don’t like us anyway

The curtains may fade but they will do so whether the clocks are put forward an hour or not

IT’S time for the Gold Coast to go it alone on daylight saving.

From Coomera to Coolangatta, from 2023, no ifs or buts, we need to adopt our own version of daylight saving.

Call it Gold Coast Time, GCT, like AEDT or AEST. We can put our clocks forward an hour next October to synchronise with NSW and Victoria.

Forget the rest of Queensland. They don’t like us anyway. We’re way too brash and confident for the cow cocky set.

Even Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner wants daylight saving. It could be done through a local government bylaw, avoiding the need for a legislative change by the state government.

Tom Tate is a go-getter Mayor and knows first-hand the damage being in a different time zone is doing to the city’s economy.

It’s not like the government particularly likes or rates us anyway. The fact the Mayor is not even on the Olympic Games organising committee – despite the city hosting nine venues – shows they treat us with contempt.

Disappointingly, both the Labor government and the opposition don’t support daylight saving, worried it will hurt their vote in the bush.

That’s because daylight saving will apparently fade their curtains and send their cows troppo. There’s a joke that goes around in NSW every time they adopt daylight saving and we don’t.

It goes like this: So, Queensland is now officially an hour behind NSW but we all know it’s more like 30 years.

It only gets reinforced when Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk says Queensland hospitals are for Queenslanders. After backing down on the dumbest policy in a generation, the land tax sting, she said: “As long as we keep beating NSW in Origin, it doesn’t matter.’’ So let’s debunk a few myths about daylight saving. The cows can’t tell the time, so their milk production won’t be affected.

The curtains may fade but they will do so whether the clocks are put forward an hour or not.

Will your power bill go down? Who knows? If you have six-hour showers, probably not.

You may detect a certain sense of mirth in my writings today, dear reader – and you’d be right. This whole argument around daylight saving is farcical.

A referendum on the subject, unlike that taken in 1994, would be a resounding “yes’’ and we’d join the other states and you wouldn’t have this summer of madness, where flights are missed and people are caught on the hop by the different time zones.

Yet our political leaders don’t have the courage to do anything about it. Isn’t that their job, to reflect the views of the majority? Or was that notion of representing the people just a passing fad among our political elite?

A bit like the decision by Essendon Football Club to sack a new CEO because he was a Christian. Even the Romans didn’t get that radical.

A novel approach, backed by Dan Andrews, the Victorian Premier, who is giving Greens leader Adam Bandt a run for his money as the country’s most divisive politician.

In the US, certain states have different time zones in different counties. Anyway, what’s wrong with dividing Queensland?

The government does it now in the way they shorthange the bush on health care and transport infrastructure, so why shouldn’t they do it on daylight saving?

The annual summer madness on the Gold CoastTweed border over daylight saving will continue while we continue to vote for cowards who only make decisions based on whether it will get them re-elected next time.

It’s time they saw the light. Or, better still, were shown the door.