Daylight-Saving a Mixed Blessing

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 196, 8 November 1927, Page 1

Daylight-Saving a Mixed Blessing

SUMMER TIME MEALS

DOMESTIC PROBLEMS “Regular habits, particularly in eating, take a lot of breaking,” said a restaurant proprietor this morning. “You can’t alter them by legislation.” AyiTH one or two exceptions the first week-day of daylight - saving passed without any great inconvenience, but that a general rearrangement of domestic routine will be necessary later in the season, is already fairly obvious. “Business yesterday was very slack,” said another restaurateur. His experience was that the mid-day luncheon an hour earlier in the day was not appreciated, patrons being more inclined for a cup of tea and “something light.” With theatres commencing half an hour later, it was also found that there was an appreciable falling off in the supper trade, theatregoers making at once for trams and buses as soon as the theatres emptied. To meet this situation the suggestion has already been made to a SUN presentative that the transport services run until half an hour later. That daylight-saving will result in a longer working day to quite a large section of the community is an opinion that was frequently expressed. “It might be quite all right for those who want to play tennis or bowls,” one housewife complains, “but keeping tea until it gets dark makes a very long day.” SIX O’CLOCK DINNER Signs are not wanting that six o’clock dinner with the sun still fairly high in the heavens is not going to prove a popular meal. In private homes the situation can perhaps be met with a light tea at a later hour, but in the hotels and board-ing-houses, in which quite a large proportion of the* city’s population is accommodated, labour union regulations do not permit of elastic meal hours. Here it is suggested that restaurant proprietors might find some compensation. Until darkness falls tennis and bowling enthusiasts will probably be content to remain on the courts and greens, making afternoon tea and supper take the place of the orthodox, but now inconvenient, six o’clock dinner. Perhaps for some, “a loaf of bread, a jug of wine and thou,” will suffice.