This weekend, I have to vote. What I am voting for is strange. There is a referendum on for whether or not Western Australia adopts Daylight Savings.

Daylight Savings is something you do to get more hours of daylight during the winter. In the winter season in temperate countries, there are less hours of sunlight during the day than there would be during the summer season. This of course, can have an effect on trading hours and so on.

So what you do is you set your clocks ahead one hour in the winter. This means you get up earlier in the morning and you get more hours of daylight.

The East Coast states in Australia have adopted Daylight Savings. Western Australia is usually two or three hours behind the East Coast depending on the season.

So what the Western Australian government decided to do was to trial Daylight Savings for three years. They mucked it up royally.

First off, it only makes sense to apply the concept during the winter months. This then allows the hours of daylight to be evened out between the summer and winter months and it makes sense because everyone’s body clock can operate at a somewhat regular schedule rather than shift with the seasons.

Instead, the state government applied this during the summer months. This is what happens when politicians and their advisors don’t take high school level Geography. If the east coast states apply it during the summer months that probably is due to the fact that they have slightly different weather patterns on the east coast. I mean, it snows in Melbourne!

The end result is that for three years the Western Australia population was annoyingly cheesed off that they had to get up earlier during the summer months when they were going to stay up later anyway. How weird is it to have the sun set at nine in the evening?

In the summer, it usually rises at 6 a.m. and sets at a decent time of six or seven in the evening. There were lots of stories from parents who could not get their kids to go to bed because it was still light outside and so the kids weren’t tired.

Then everytime we switched back to winter we were too sluggish, too tired, too knackered. We weren’t getting enough time, enough hours, enough sleep.

Now finally the curse is over. The referendum is on this Saturday. We now get to vote for whether we want it or not. However the current state government (The Liberals) are sending around their biggest idiot (and yes, he is an idiot) to fan the flames and attempt everyone to vote ‘Yes’ on Saturday. If they bring the damned thing back, I am moving.

The daylight thing does affect me, I was born and raised in the tropics. My body is tuned into things like how much daylight there is and so on. I could have lived with Daylight Savings had they introduced it during the winter instead but really, now that I have gotten used to Perth weather somewhat, the last thing I want is anyone going and messing with it.

I don’t know of anyone who has benefited from it. Sure, some people had longer trading hours during the summer, but they had shorter trading hours during the winter and so this didn’t work out. In fact, if attracting business is all that the Liberals are concerned about then they should stop fighting the motion for allowing longer trading hours on the weekends and the ability to trade 24/7.

People complain all the time that Perth is not a cosmopolitan city. But the only way to become a cosmopolitan city is to cater to as many different lifestyles of the people living in it as possible. Which means allowing businesses to trade after hours or 24/7 so that shift workers and night workers are provided for. It means ensuring that small businesses don’t have to pay exorbitant fees to join city councils or to register for taxes, licences and permits thereby preventing them from being a loss before they have even started trading.

It means reviewing basic wages as often as possible in an attempt to see if they match up to the standard of living and its costs. It means providing more tangible assistance to those making the transition into the workforce. It means making basic needs more accessible.

This is why I never vote for parties. I find that the logic and the basic knowledge behind party policies is often lacking. On Saturday I am going to have to also vote for a by-election for Fremantle, thereby electing someone to the city council (if I have got that right).

I am currently wondering why I can see the mayor doing the political rounds but not any of the candidates running for the by-election. Heck, I don’t even know who they are yet though obviously I will endeavour to find out before I turn up. But it makes me wonder if they are really trying at all?

I walk around Fremantle everyday. There are people handing out leaflets for all sorts of causes but none for those running for the by-election. There are no posters up in the Town Hall. No adverts on TV. Not really much in the city’s newspaper. Where are these mysterious candidates hiding? Where? Nothing has been stuffed in my mailbox recently, though the Labour representative for Fremantle loves being in constant contact but she isn’t running. I know, everyone is supposed to vote.

It’s compulsory. So you don’t need to advertise to get people to turn up but you still do need to advertise to convince them to vote for you or your candidate. I suppose people expect the favourite (i.e: the Labour candidate since Fremantle is a Labour stronghold and practically the birthplace of the Labour party itself) to win. That doesn’t mean you don’t try.