Very mean time

There is a slippery notion on the loose that Greenwich Mean Time is an imperialist enslavement of the clock. In fact, at the longitude for London, GMT is God’s own time: it’s noon when the sun is highest in the sky. Against this background, the EU has made encouraging noises to the idea of keeping its clocks on the same time all year round. This couldn’t make them any more aberrant than now. Spaniards, for example, whose country lies on the Greenwich meridian, are obliged in summer to get up two hours early. Neighbouring Portugal keeps to the same time as Britain. That does mean that after lunch in Spain it is possible to walk over the border and find that lunch is only just beginning. Such Mad Hatter time might soon apply to Britain and Ireland. Walk the wrong way and you get no lunch at all.