In July, a petition calling for the veto of Law No. 4201 on timekeeping was posted on the website of the President of Ukraine. The signature collection will last for another 66 days, but more than 11,000 Ukrainians out of the 25,000 required have already joined the petition. The author of the petition is MP Oleksiy Honcharenko, reports Komersant ukrainskyi
According to him, the draft law No. 4201 on time calculation, which is supposed to cancel the change of clocks to “winter” and “summer” time, voted by the Verkhovna Rada, causes significant problems and inconveniences, primarily for citizens.
“So, now, according to the ‘new time’, dawn in the summer will come around 3 am (now it is 4 am), which will be especially noticeable in the east of the country. And it will get dark around 8pm,” the petitioner said.
The MP stressed that the decision to cancel the time change will not be helpful in saving electricity, especially given the lost capacity and constant attacks on our energy system by Russia.
“Because now the electricity costs for consumers and businesses in the evening hours in spring, summer and autumn will increase,” Goncharenko said.
Also, due to the “winter time”, Ukraine will have a two-hour difference with Europe.
“This will significantly affect the effectiveness of our cooperation with partners.
Therefore, the relevant draft law is completely incomplete and harmful to the whole country,” the MP believes.
Earlier, the Academy of Sciences of Higher Education of Ukraine, a public association of scientists, wrote a letter to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy with a similar request to veto Law No. 4201.
On 16 July, the Verkhovna Rada passed the law “On Timekeeping in Ukraine” cancelling the change of time from winter to summer. This means that on the last Sunday of October, the time will be changed to winter time and will not be changed again. Starting from 27 October 2024, Ukraine will always have UTC 2/Eastern European Time (EET), which is two hours ahead of Greenwich Mean Time.
Author: Alyona Kaplina