[tz] Ambiguous abbreviations for Australian timezones when daylight savings is in affect [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

Peter Stagg P.Stagg at bom.gov.au
Mon Apr 8 02:26:13 UTC 2013


"Lies, damned lies, and statistics" - I guess it depends on how you cut the cloth:

search: legislation "standard time" "daylight saving" site:.gov.au
About 25,600 results (0.21 seconds) 

search: legislation "standard time" "summer time" site:.gov.au
About 15,600 results (0.14 seconds)

Yes in some cases you will find the following: 'daylight saving time ("summer time")'; that to me supports the notion of "daylight saving" ahead of "summer time".

N.B. ".gov.au" searches all state and federal official sites as they all use this domain. (e.g. Federal = just .gov.au, State i.e. Victoria = .vic.gov.au ).

I've noticed through my various searches of government websites that whilst the legislative instruments for time may often use the term "Summer Time" (Vic & NSW only) their public facing information sites use the term "Daylight Saving".

http://www.nsw.gov.au/daylight-saving
http://www.business.vic.gov.au/operating-a-business/how-to-start/trading-hours/daylight-saving
http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/time
http://www.dpac.tas.gov.au/divisions/policy/daylightsavings
http://www.cmd.act.gov.au/communication/holidays
http://www.safework.sa.gov.au/show_page.jsp?id=2675

WA, QLD and NT do not have daylight savings but still:
http://www.premiers.qld.gov.au/publications/categories/reports/daylight-saving.aspx
http://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/parliament/bills.nsf/BillProgressPopup?openForm&ParentUNID=9A1B183144403DA54825721200088DF1

And yes these are cherry-picked - to the most part these ar all public facing official government pages communicating to the Australian populous about "Daylight Saving" not "Summer Time" - if "Summer Time" was lingua franca, don't you think they (we) would use it?

Peter Stagg


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