THE ISLAND OF IRELAND is facing the bizarre prospect of a 'time-zone border' once the UK leaves the EU after the European Parliament voted to scrap daylight savings time.
It will effectively mean that Northern Ireland will be an hour ahead of the Republic of Ireland for half of the year.
The decision to stop moving the clocks back an hour in the autumn and forward again in the spring was made back in March, and will come into effect from 2021.
This will mean that the Republic of Ireland will remain in the same time-zone all year round, but Northern Ireland wouldn't.
EU national governments still have to approve abolishing time-shifting, with a "qualified majority" of member states needed to back the move.
That means it needs the support of 55% of member states, representing at least 65% of the EU's population.
They will then have to decide which time-zone they would prefer to stay in; "permanent summer" or "permanent winter".
On Sunday, the clocks went back an hour, giving us all an extra hour in bed ... lovely. But this will become a thing of the past for the people of Ireland come 2021.
Originally, the 1916 Summer Time Act was introduced in order to give farmer an an extra hour of daylight to work in, in a bid to increase their output, particularly to help the war effort at the time.
The UK has said it is staunchly against the idea of scrapping the act.
Dublin has said in the past that it too was against getting rid of the change, but if the vote passes, it will be taken out of their hands.
