Dear Santa,

All I want for Christmas is for Daylight Saving to be introduced into South East Queensland…

Well unfortunately, I don’t think that will happen this year, but if I make an effort to be really good for the next 12 months, Santa might just bring me the perfect gift for next Christmas.

Yes, it’s Christmas time again, and for most people that means spending time with family, or at the very least, making contact with loved ones. Interesting to note, that Christmas Day traditionally ranks as having one of the highest proportion of phone calls, as many families are unable to make the trip to visit those in other states, or even other countries.

Now, when making a phone call between South East Queensland and Western Australia, South Australia, or an overseas destination, it is second nature to take into account the time difference. However, isn’t it frustrating that when phoning between South East Queensland and New South Wales or Victoria, the one hour daylight saving time difference is so often forgotten by our relatives, or even ourselves.

So why does this confusion reign? Well those residing in international destinations, along with residents in South Australia and Western Australia, are in a completely different time zone to those of us here in South East Queensland. Therefore, it is quite natural when contact is made between South East Queensland and these locations, that we stop to calculate the time difference before making the call. However, South East Queensland shares the same longitudinally-based time zone as New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania. Given that these eastern states adopt Daylight Saving for half the year, it is not completely natural for this additional time difference to be taken into consideration.

This annoyance and frustration at Christmas, carries over to New Year’s Eve, when at the stroke of 11pm, a number of us in South East Queensland are inundated by calls and text messages wishing us a happy new year, when for us, that’s not for another hour. It certainly doesn’t make sense when friends and associates in South Australia – west of our region, are celebrating the new year half an hour before us!

Of course, this time confusion is not just isolated to Christmas and New Years Eve either. Recently, I embarked on a trip to northern New South Wales, for a family event. As is usually the case when travelling a reasonable distance, a discussion was had about what time everyone needed to depart Brisbane. A couple of relatives of mine were adamant about the correct time to leave. This was until I pointed out that the event was due to start an hour earlier than they were thinking, due to NSW having Daylight Saving and being an hour ahead of South East Queensland. If I hadn’t reminded my family members of this time difference, then there is no doubt they would have arrived at the family get-together an hour late.

Well, with any luck, and lots of hard work, the Daylight Saving for South East Queensland Party may put an end to all this confusion and frustration, by succeeding in having Daylight Saving introduced into the South East region.

Earlier this month, the Party celebrated its first birthday. We acknowledged this milestone, by sharing some very nice cake and donuts with a number of our members. We took this time to reflect upon what an amazing 12 months of political reality it has been for us all. A number of supporters also shared our enthusiasm about the future of the Party in progressing the issue of Daylight Saving. We have some big plans over the coming months, and we will share them with you as we progress.

I would like to once again say thank you all for your support throughout the year and I invite you to continue following us on our journey throughout 2010.

On behalf of the Executive team, we would like to wish you all a safe and enjoyable Christmas and New Year’s.

Remember – ‘It’s About Time!’

Jason Furze

Party Leader