This podcast is brought to you by Koala now Zara Daylight Saving has officially ended as of this morning. Do you know what that means?
It gets darker earlier.
That is one part of it, which we are about to explain in the pod. But the most important thing is that most of us, depending on what state or territory you're in, just got an extra hour of sleep. I don't know about you, but I'm feeling excellent news it is. I'm feeling particularly rested right now. So why not make it count with the Koala Experience life changing rest on their innovative award winning mattress or enjoy a cheeky nap on one of their ultra comfy sofa beds.
I could nap for Australia. That sounds good to me. Don't waste that extra hour. Check out the full range at Koala dot com. Already and this is the Daily This is the Daily OS. Oh now it makes sense. Good morning and welcome to the Daily OS. It's Sunday, the weeks of April.
I'm billyfit Simon's, I'm Zara Seidler.
We are here, bright and early on a Sunday morning, bringing you another bonus episode because it is a course, a very special day. If you're woken up this morning thinking Wow, what a beautiful morning, the sun is shining and I've woken up earlier than I usually do, well, that's because daylight saving has officially ended. Now it is one of two times during the year that clocks change, but this one is the good one because it's when the clocks go backwards and you gain an extra hour
of sleep. Today, we're going to explain to you why we actually have daylight saving in the first place, and answer the questions that you've probably thought about over the years but you've never actually known the answers to. And just a quick note before we get started that this episode is sponsored by Koala, who care about making sure that you are getting a very good night's sleep, but they have had no editorial influence over the content that we are sharing in today's podcast.
Billy, I think you're the only person in the whole of Australia who has referred to daylight saving ending as the good one of the post.
Do you mean days get shorter, Yeah, but we gain an extra hour of sleep.
In the dark.
I am one of those weird people and it's taken me many years to come to terms with the fact that I think I am finally confident enough to admit that I like winter. I think I'd prefer it more than.
I her.
I know, I feel like I will be shunned by society for saying that, but actually I like that it's darker in the afternoons, and I'm finally not sorry about it.
Okay, Well, if you means shunned by society, meaning shunned by me, correct dead to me. Anyway, let's talk about this podcast. So obviously we're talking about the clocks changing. We're going into a different season. How does the end of daylight saving affect something like your sleep? Because I have a partner who, for three weeks after clocks change, will tell me every night that he's had an extra hour of sleep.
He's right, basically, I mean it was only this morning, but still you feel the impacts of it for a few days after. Definitely. So when the clocks go back like they just did this morning, it is better for our sleep than when they go forward, which is why it's the good ones. Okay, so obviously we all just gained this extra hour of sleep, which is a positive depending on how you see it. And like I said, usually those positive effects do last for a couple of days,
but they do then subside. But also during winter, we usually do sleep better because since it gets darker earlier, our body clocks start getting ready for sleep earlier, and so that means that we do go to bed earlier and usually we're getting longer nights sleep, which is a great thing. Again, it's when we lose an hour of sleep when daylight saving. I always want to say daylight savings, but.
It's actually, honestly that the most complex part of this hour.
But so when daylight saving begins again, that's when it's not great and it can be quite disruptive to out sleep cycles. But for now, and for Zara's partner Olie shout out to Olie, we can all enjoy it for sure.
Okay, So really, I mean that all makes sense to me. I think the one thing that perhaps doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me is why we have it.
Wait, I have to interrupt you quickly because I remember that I have one question that I don't know the answer to that I would really like someone in the audience to tell me. Okay, so I have not been at a club when daylight saving has ended?
Club club?
And I would like I can't help you out. I would like to know if anyone's been at a club when that has happened. Do they get an extra hour at the club because of daylight at the club? Do we still call it a club not shot nightclub? I have no idea. Maybe it sounds really triocky, but do you get an extra hour at the nightclub when daylight saving ends?
Okay, that's where your brain went. My brain w to healthcare workers who are doing overnight shifts.
And you're a much better person than me.
No, it's because I remember talking to someone once about whether or not you get paid for the extra hour of work.
I don't remember what the answer. Wait, that's such an interesting question.
They must they must, I mean, let us know. Please, if you're a healthcare worker, if you get paid an extra hour for working on this Saturday night.
And forget about the nightclub question. Now I feel like a bad person.
Anyway, I'm just going to segue and move forward from there to the thing I think we're all thinking about, Billy, why do we have daylight saving?
Okay, so it's all got to do with the Earth's rotation. So, as many of us know from our year sick science classes, shout out to mister Ronaldson, the sun rises and sets at different times throughout the year as a result of Earth rotating on its axis. And also, as we all remember, the Earth is also moving around the Sun, and it's because of that movement that it means that there are times when Australia gets it's more sunshine and then also
times that we get less sunshine. Now, daylight saving is all about maximizing how much sun we get during the warmer months. So if we go back to just right before summer started in October, that's when we move the clocks forward so that everyone can enjoy more sunshine in
the evening. And you know, you and I live on the East Coast in Australia and you'll often see at the beach at like eight pm or eight thirty pm people are somehow still like some baking on the beach and that's because of daylight saving that they can do that. But then in April, what we had this morning, that's when the clocks go back and it becomes much darker
in the afternoons. Like you said, by the time we're leaving work, it is often the sun is often setting and it's getting darker, so that's when daylight saving ends. So we're no longer in the daylight saving period.
Okay, so if we didn't change the clocks, it would be super dark like it has been for the last cup weeks every time I've woken up to get ready.
It's so tack.
Yeah.
Yeah.
If we didn't do this every April, by the time winter arrives, many of us would end up heading to school and work in the literal dark again, just because of how the Southern hemisphere is positioned in relation to the sun during that time. So, for example, the sun would rise at about eight thirty am in Adelaide in June if daylight saving didn't end.
Very Scandinavian now, apart from us obviously enjoying the sun for longer in summer, that isn't actually why it started, though, Yeah.
Started for a different reason. It started to help energy usage. So interesting, so interesting, I only just learned about this. So it was first popularized as a way to conserve fuel in European countries during World War One, and that's because with more daylight at the end of the day, rather than the beginning, people could drive home and cook their dinners by daylight instead of needing to use gas or electric lights to see what they were doing. So
that started in Europe during World War One. Australia soon followed and it used daylight saving as well during war, and then it dropped it in peacetime. But then the idea stuck around, and it was in the late nineteen
sixties that Tasmania always a trailblazer. They brought it back during a drought that left water supplies for hydroelectric energy dangerously low, and so that meant that they brought it back again to conserve energy, and Tasmania has had it ever since, and most other regions followed suit in Australia, and the logic still obviously holds up today because when it's lighter in the afternoons, you don't need to use electricity for your lights.
You said there that most other regions followed suit after Tazzi went first. But daylight saving isn't a thing in all states and territories right.
No, So it's not in Queensland, WA, or the Northern Territory Zara. Do you know what those three jurisdictions have in.
Common anyone that I have a meeting with in any three of those jurisdictions, I get the time wrong with.
Yeah, that's because they're in a different time zone. Correct. That's my answer to the question.
What's the real answer?
Okay, the real answer is because they are Australia's three largest jurisdictions by land area. When I learned this, I was confused because I thought that New South Wales would have been part of the top three, but no, Northern
Territory is actually larger than New South Wales. Now, their sheer size means that there is a big divide between the coastal city dwellers who want an extra hour of sun in the evening, and then the rural and farming communities who are getting up for work who want it to be light in the morning and who don't want
to be, you know, sweating through the afternoon working. Now Western Australia, which is our largest state, they have actually held four failed referendums over the years on daylight saving and in the last referendum, the no vote was strongest again in regional and rural areas, with a whopping eighty six percent of voters in the central wheat belt say
no to daylight saving. And for farmers, daylight saving can be really disruptive, not just for themselves and their work schedule, but also for their livestock.
So I've heard this a lot before.
Yeah, so we know that for cows, for example, daylight saving it can really confuse them if suddenly the light schedule is changing, and it really disrupts their natural cycles as well. Queensland is especially split, so you know, with different hours of daylight, and there are different climates and different work all of these make for really different ideas about daylight saving and it's quite a controversial topic there.
I really liked this one quote that I wanted to read out, which I think will end on It was from a Queensland MP when the state debated daylight saving in the eighties. They said, if one lived in cans in summertime, the two things that one would not want would be more sunshine and more daylight, which I think is quite fair. It must be extremely hot. I imagine that's the last thing you want.
And I mean, just as we end this, I do think it's interesting that this is not a uniquely Australian conversation that we're having I remember when I was researching this a few years ago. The US is kind of having this ongoing similar debate. There's been a piece of legislation in the Senate, I'm pretty sure for years age. Every time I check, it's just stalled there. So look, no one can agree. Of course, Australia is such a big country, so divided, so many needs, so many perspectives.
But now I understand a little more about daylight saving. So thank you so much, Billy, thank you, and a massive thank you to Kohala for making this episode possible. We will of course be back with our deep dive tomorrow morning, but until then, enjoy the shorter.
Day, enjoy the extra hours of sleep.
There you go, all a matter of perspective, my name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda bunge Lung Kalgotin woman from Gadigal Country. The Daily oz acknowledges that this podcast is on the lands of the Gadigal people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Straight Island and nations. We pay our respects to the first peoples of these countries, both past and present.
While you can't control the clocks, you absolutely can control your sleep quality with a little help from our friends at Koala, whether it's live changing sleep on an innovative, award winning mattress or a chicky nap. As Billy said on one of their ultra comfy sofa beds, You've got an hour of extra sleep now, so why not make it count. Sleep better, feel better, and wake up refreshed. See the full range at koala dot com and give yourself the sleep that you deserve.