What Does Moving To Permanent Daylight Savings Time Mean For British Columbians?

Photo Credit: Ben Nelms/CBC

For the past 70 years, British Columbians have complied with the practice of daylight savings time (DST) — turning their clocks forward an hour on the first Sunday of March and moving them back an hour on the first Sunday of November. However, this year, on Mar. 8, the majority of British Columbians moved their clocks an hour ahead for the last time. 

BC Premier David Eby announced on Mar. 2 that the province will adopt permanent, year-round DST, ending the twice-a-year ritual of changing the time on every single clock and device one owns. 

To do this, BC will create a new time zone known as Pacific Time. It will align all year with the Yukon Territory’s system, which previously changed to permanent DST in 2020. During the winter, Pacific Time will align with Alberta and other areas that follow Mountain Standard Time, and during the summer, it will align with Pacific Standard Time regions such as California, Oregon, and Washington. 

BC residents will experience sunrises and sunsets as normal until Nov. 1, when clocks will not move back an hour, bringing darker mornings and lighter evenings across the province. 

What prompted the change of time system in BC?

When announcing the move, Eby said changing the clocks causes “all types of problems,” including causing parents and children to lose sleep, dogs to wake up at the wrong time, and an increased rate of car accidents, according to CBC. He also pointed to a 2019 survey, which found that the majority of British Columbians prefer permanent time over changing clocks. 

In the summer of 2019, the province launched a public engagement to gather residents’ opinions on biannual clock changes. It drew participation from 223,000 people, and found that 93 per cent of participants supported switching to permanent DST. According to CBC, three-quarters of participants who endorsed permanent DST cited health and wellness concerns as reasons for why they wanted the change. 

Following the results of BC’s survey, the Interpretation Amendment Act was passed in 2019 by the BC government, which enabled the Province to adopt permanent DST in the future. However, the provincial government stated at the time that the move would only be made in conjunction with the states of Washington, Oregon, and California, according to CBC. 

As of 2026, the US has yet to change its clock system, even after continued deliberation. In 2019, the then-Governor of Washington, Jay Inslee, signed a bill to lock Washington’s clocks to DST. However, it required federal approval to take effect; the Uniform Time Act of 1966, which initially put biannual clock changes into effect at a national scale, would need to be amended. In an attempt to accomplish this, the Sunshine Protection Act, a bill that would make DST permanent nationwide, was introduced in 2018 by Senator Marco Rubio. However, no legislation on the issue has been passed by Congress since. Most recently, in February, Representative Greg Steube introduced a national bill aiming to move time permanently 30 minutes forward, halfway between DST and standard time (ST), according to USA Today.

Both permanent DST and ST eliminate the need for biannual clock changes, but while DST permanently shifts clocks an hour ahead in the spring, ST permanently shifts clocks an hour behind in the fall. As a result, while DST offers darker mornings but lighter evenings, ST offers lighter mornings but darker evenings.

Additionally, one of Trump’s 2024 campaign promises was to end time changes. He described them as “inconvenient” and “costly,” according to The New York Times. In April 2025, Trump posted on X encouraging Congress to “push hard for more daylight at the end of a day.”

BC has finally made the time switch without coordination from western states in the US, potentially due to Canada’s changing relationship with its southern neighbour. 

According to CBC, on Mar. 2, when announcing BC’s switch to permanent DST, Eby stated, "We are done waiting. British Columbia is going to change our clocks just one more time — and then never again.”

Furthermore, according to the Government of BC’s website, “Actions from the U.S. have shifted how BC approaches decisions that merit alignment, including on time zones.” They do not elaborate on what specific actions from the US prompted this decision, although CBC cites “fraying US relations,” such as plummeting tourist activity between BC and Washington. Many Canadian tourists have been avoiding travel to the US as part of a larger economic boycott, fueled by months of tariff threats and rising trade tensions between the US and Canada.

Critics of BC’s Announcement

There have been critics of the BC government’s move to adopt permanent DST: some predict negative consequences will stem from the province’s misalignment with its neighbouring jurisdictions, while others label the decision as an attempted distraction by Eby.

Back in 2019, the Vancouver Airport Authority, the governing body of Vancouver International Airport, requested BC align its time zone with nearby regions before making the switch to permanent time, to avoid causing unnecessary confusion for travellers.

In response to the announced change, a spokesperson for the Vancouver Airport Authority said that proper time zone alignment is "fundamental" for airline operations and efficient scheduling. "We will work with industry to better understand the potential schedule and passenger implications of moving to permanent daylight saving time without neighbouring jurisdictions also following suit," the statement said.

Bridgitte Anderson, President and CEO of the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade, expressed her own concerns. “The choice to change the time unilaterally will create an additional headache for businesses operating on both sides of the border," she said in a statement.

Furthermore, according to a statement from Ryan Mitton, the BC director of legislative affairs for the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, “While some may be relieved not to change the clocks each year, the lack of coordination with other jurisdictions risks causing confusion and disruption.”

"This appears motivated by an attempt to distract from the province's $13-billion deficit, not genuine concern for the impacts of the time change," Mitton added.

UBC political science professor Stewart Prest agrees. “I do think there is an attempt to turn the page from the budget, which was not well received by just about anyone,” he told Global News.

BC Conservative Party interim Leader Trevor Halford is also skeptical about the province’s decision to move to permanent DST right now. In principle, he agrees that time changes should be ditched, but questions the timing of Eby’s announcement.

“The premier is trying to distract right now — and I kind of don’t blame him,” Halford told CTV News. “Because if you go outside this building, nothing seems to be going right.”

“The reality is, every once in a while, our government will try and do something that is popular,” the premier said on Mar. 2, according to CTV News.

The Scientific Community’s Opinions on Permanent DST

Moreover, studies show that a clock change in the springtime leads to health problems, decreased worker productivity, and a higher chance of accidents occurring.

For instance, a study tracking hospital admissions across the state of Michigan found that there was a 24 per cent increase in heart attacks the Monday after the switch to DST, according to the American Heart Association.

Next, a study conducted by the University of Oregon and published in 2024 found that adjusting to losing an hour in the springtime doesn’t just hinder worker productivity for a day or two, but can negatively affect it for up to two weeks, according to CTV.

Finally, as per Global News, a 2020 study published in the journal Current Biology and conducted in the US found that the spring transition to DST increased the risk of fatal traffic accidents by six per cent.

An article published in 2022 by The Atlantic also reported that biannual clock changes are not beneficial for teenagers. A natural delay in a teenager’s biological clock is normal and occurs naturally without external causes. Changing the clocks two times a year messes up their biological clock even more, especially since most teenagers already do not get the required amount of sleep. A lack of sleep can lead to depression and other mental health problems. 

However, while many scientists and sleep experts agree that ditching the biannual clock change is the best course of action, some warn that switching to permanent DST will still weaken public health and safety. These critics instead call for a switch to permanent ST, because it aligns more closely with solar time and natural circadian rhythms. However, the 2019 survey that helped inspire the province’s move to permanent DST did not include an option to switch to permanent ST, according to CBC.

In a study published in September 2025 and conducted in the US, researchers from Stanford used a mathematical model to quantify light exposure under three different time systems — permanent ST, permanent DST, and biannual shifting — to see how a person’s circadian rhythm would be affected over a year-long period. The circadian rhythm is the body’s internal 24-hour clock that governs physiological processes.

“The circadian clock is like the conductor of an orchestra, synchronizing various organs of the body together through a strong circadian signal,” said Stanford graduate student Lara Weed in a news release. “A stronger clock, generated through more regular morning light exposure, leads to more optimal function of these organ systems.”

“We found that staying in standard time or staying in daylight saving time is definitely better than switching twice a year,” said Jamie Zeitzer, a senior author of the study and psychiatry and behavioural sciences professor Stanford, in a news release. 

The study found that permanent ST would result in 300,000 fewer Americans having a stroke and 2.6 million fewer having obesity, as per the news release. However, the Stanford researchers found that permanent DST would only have two-thirds of the same reduction effects that permanent ST does. 

“You generally need more morning light and less evening light to keep well synchronized to a 24-hour day,” Zeitzer added. “The more light exposure you get at the wrong times, the weaker the circadian clock. All of these things that are downstream — for example, your immune system, your energy — don’t match up quite as well.”

Furthermore, The Atlantic warns that if DST were to become permanent, many high school students would have to travel to school in darkness, and their bodies would be confused as to what time it is.  

National and International Shifts Towards Permanent DST

Elsewhere in Canada, other provinces have shown interest in modifying their time systems.

In 2020, Ontario passed a law that enables the province to switch to permanent DST. However, the legislation can only come into effect if two of the province’s neighbouring jurisdictions, Quebec and New York state, make the change as well, according to CTV News.

Although Quebec has yet to make a switch to permanent time, a public consultation held in 2024 showed strong public support in favour of permanent DST, as per CTV News. However, New York’s decision on the matter hinges upon the passing of the Sunshine Conservation Act in the US, similarly to Washington.

Internationally, other countries have experimented with permanent DST in the past, but later terminated the system due to public criticism. In the 1970s, the US was dealing with an energy crisis and decided to make the change to permanent DST, hoping to  conserve energy. Congress passed a law to implement the system for two years, but repealed it before the two years were up in 1974. David Prerau, an author and expert on DST, shared with NPR that Congress’s decision to repeal the change came from public pushback. “It became very unpopular very quickly,” he shared. 

In 1968, Britain moved their clocks forward an hour and did not move them back, calling this year-round system British Standard Time (BST). As per a 2012 BBC audio feature, the Department for Transport believed that switching from a biannual clock change to permanent time would decrease the probability of car accidents for children going to and from school. With this new system, there was a reduction in traffic accidents, but the situation “wasn’t that simple,” according to the feature. 

In the feature, past clips from a Radio 4 report shared the story of a young child who was hit by a car in the early morning darkness. According to the feature, “with one tragic death, public opinion started to swing against it.” Concerns were also raised by early morning workers who did not like working in the darkness, including milk carriers, construction staff, and farmers. The experiment ended in 1971. 

More recently, in 2011, Russia switched to permanent DST. According to BBC, the decision was popular at first, but eventually, a 2013 survey reported that less than one-third of citizens wanted to keep the clocks forward permanently. 

In criticism of permanent DST, Russian MPs cited increased health and stress problems for citizens and specifically cited medical reports that showed an escalated number of morning car accidents in 2012 compared to previous years. Russian President Vladimir Putin formally abolished permanent DST in 2014. 

While the change to permanent DST in BC has gained national attention, opinions and perspectives have varied from person to person. However, the true consequences of this switch will not be known until Nov. 1. The question remains: will this help British Columbians for the better? Or is it only a matter of months before we go back to switching the clock? Only time will tell.