The EU marmot is always greeted: another debate on the time change [premium]

European Parliament members have launched a new initiative to end the biannual clock change in the European Union. Peter Liese, a German member of the European Parliament from the Christian Democratic Union, announced the move on Tuesday. He aims to force member states and the European Commission to act after eight years of stalled negotiations. Liese, who practiced medicine until 2003, cites health concerns as his primary motivation. He stated that many individuals suffer from sleep disturbances, fatigue, and concentration problems following the time shift. Scientific studies indicate a temporarily increased risk of heart attacks in the spring after the switch. He added that the energy savings originally hoped for from daylight saving time have not materialized under current working conditions. To build political pressure, Liese established a parliamentary group. Forty-four eurodeputies from fifteen EU member states and six political groups signed a joint letter. They addressed the EU transport ministers, who hold competence over this issue through the Transport, Telecommunications and Energy Council. The goal is to restart the deadlocked negotiations in the ministerial council. Two Austrian members of the People's Party joined the initiative: Sophia Kircher and Lukas Mandl. Other supporters include former Estonian Prime Minister Juri Ratas and David McAllister, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the EU Parliament. Liese noted that the Brussels authority commissioned a study on the impacts of abolishing the time change. This report is expected later this year. For eight years, member states have used the lack of an impact assessment as an excuse to delay action. Liese argued that once the study arrives at the end of the year, there will be no more excuses. The debate resurfaces despite previous efforts being buried quietly since 2018. Both EU members and the Commission have avoided touching the topic for several reasons. The first obstacle is the geographic imbalance of the data supporting the abolition. A pan-European survey held in summer 2018 attracted 4.6 million participants, a high turnout for such polls. The results clearly favored ending mandatory time changes. However, 3.3 million respondents came from Germany and Austria alone. In contrast, Spain recorded only 90,000 votes, while Italy had just 20,000. This skew complicates the mandate for a uniform rule. A second problem emerged from the survey itself. It did not clarify whether citizens preferred permanent summer time or winter time. Preferences varied significantly depending on geographic location. In Austria, high participation in 2018 was partly driven by tabloid media promoting a specific outcome. The history of the practice dates back to World War I, where it was introduced to reduce electricity consumption due to earlier evening darkness. This rationale no longer holds true in modern Europe. At the European level, the transition dates were gradually standardized starting in the early 1980s. The current harmonized dates for switching between winter and summer time have been in effect since 1998. The new push seeks to overcome these historical and statistical hurdles to finalize a decision.