Daylight saving time in Australia
Queensland and Western Australia have subsequently observed daylight saving on a trial basis on several occasions.
As part of the transition to earlier daylight saving, those states and Tasmania all finished on the first Sunday in April.
[full citation needed] [5] The referendum result displayed a distinct trend – that public opinion on daylight saving in Queensland is geographically divided, with the 'no' vote strongest in the north and west regional districts, while the 'yes' vote was strongest in the state's metropolitan south-east.
[6] Since the early 2000s, there have been a number of petitions submitted to Queensland Parliament, lobbying for the introduction of daylight-saving time or for another referendum to be held.
[8] In October 2007, the completed government-commissioned research was presented to a newly sworn-in Premier Anna Bligh, who ruled out holding a new referendum, despite the report indicating 59% of Queensland residents and 69% of South East Queenslanders to be in favour of adopting daylight-saving time.
[9] In December 2008, the Daylight Saving for South East Queensland (DS4SEQ) political Party was officially registered, advocating the implementation of a dual-time zone arrangement for daylight saving time in South East Queensland while the remainder of the state maintains standard time.
[12] Wellington has called for a referendum to be held at the next State election on the introduction of daylight saving into south-east Queensland under a dual-time zone arrangement.
[13] The decision announced by the Premier on 7 June 2010 was that her Government would not support the Bill, because regional Queenslanders were overwhelmingly opposed to daylight saving.
[5] In December 2008, the Daylight Saving for South East Queensland (DS4SEQ) political party was officially registered, advocating the implementation of a dual-time zone arrangement for Daylight Saving in South East Queensland while the rest of the state maintains standard time.
[20] In 2006, the Parliament of Western Australia approved a three-year daylight saving trial to be followed by a referendum to decide whether DST should be put in place permanently.
Although as previously the suburbs of the state capital, Perth, supported the proposal, it was by a much narrower margin than before with significant swings against it in several areas, most notably in the East Metropolitan region.
[24] Despite this, in September 2016 the Daylight Saving Party was established by brothers Brett and Wilson Tucker to contest seats in the Legislative Council at the upcoming 2017 state election.
In September 2020, Monash University Professor of Diabetes Paul Zimmet claimed that the switch to daylight saving time caused an increase in heart attacks, road accidents, workplace accidents, and cognitive dysfunction, and could amplify the health issues during the COVID-19 pandemic.
However, Premier of Victoria Daniel Andrews responded that daylight saving would be part of the forthcoming summer season.
[26] Daylight saving was widely believed to be introduced as a consumer spending initiative by local councils and tourism boards throughout New South Wales.
