Page 251 - Week 01 - Thursday, 14 February 2008
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Debate (on motion by Mr Seselja) adjourned to the next sitting.
Standard Time and Summer Time Amendment Bill 2008
Mr Barr, pursuant to notice, presented the bill, its explanatory statement and a Human Rights Act compatibility statement.
Title read by Clerk.
MR BARR (Molonglo—Minister for Education and Training, Minister for Planning, Minister for Tourism, Sport and Recreation, Minister for Industrial Relations) (12.16): I move:
That this bill be agreed to in principle.
Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, the Standard Time and Summer Time Amendment Bill 2008 will provide an extra four weeks of daylight saving to the ACT by starting daylight saving on the first Sunday in October and ending on the first Sunday in April. Members may recall that last year the ACT, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania formally agreed to harmonise daylight saving arrangements from April 2008. The ACT’s agreement was made on the proviso that New South Wales agreed to change its daylight saving starting and finishing times. The New South Wales parliament subsequently passed its amending legislation in October last year.
In accordance with the agreement, the New South Wales legislation extends the daylight saving period so it will start in each year on the first rather than the last Sunday in October and end on the first Sunday in April rather than the last Sunday in March in the following year. The New South Wales legislation also provided for a transitional arrangement that the current daylight saving period would commence on 28 October 2007 in accordance with existing arrangements and end on 6 April 2008 in accordance with new arrangements.
In the ACT the Standard Time and Summer Time Act 1972 is the act that establishes standard time and summer time periods. Currently the act provides that daylight saving starts on the last Sunday in October and ends on the last Sunday in March each year, unless the responsible minister declares a different daylight saving period. On 27 August 2007, in order for the ACT to give effect to the agreed transitional arrangements, I declared a notifiable instrument, the variation to the 2007-08 summer time period, to provide that it commences on 28 October 2007 and ends on 6 April 2008, consistent with the New South Wales arrangements.
Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, this bill provides for a permanent arrangement for the harmonisation of daylight saving periods and delivers on a long-held desire by this government to bring daylight saving in line with most other states in Australia. I commend the bill to the Assembly.
Debate (on motion by Mr Stefaniak) adjourned to the next sitting.
Sitting suspended from 12.20 to 2.30 pm.
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