Time for a change?

The return from holidays – to school, to work – is not just a return to an often celebrated normality and routine, but it's also all about making new plans. And not just the usual to-do-lists: going back to the gym, starting on a new diet and the promise of leading a more healthy lifestyle, quitting smoking, signing up to different courses and so on. More importantly, it's about the debate related to our collective way of life: climate change, our economic, political, educational, social and cultural models and such like.

Lately, the initiative Ara és l'hora, which aims to reset the clocks in Catalonia and adopt more European-style timetables, has managed to make its way on to the Catalan agenda. There have been a series of official measures to encourage this initiative that aims to go towards making a positive change in our society, which would mean balancing work, school and family and private life, improve productivity and competitiveness in companies, while allowing the cultural sector to function in a way similar to most other advanced European countries. The fact that timetables in Spain are controversial because of their incompatibility with the rest of Europe is a recognised phenomenom.

One of the key aspects of the Ara és l'hora campaign is to generate cultural change in a society that is used to two-hour long lunch breaks and siestas, working until late every evening, and with 25% of the population watching TV until the early hours of the morning.

For these reasons, the initiative must involve all sectors of society. The organisation accepts that it is a proposal that will not be easy to bring to fruition but already there are some signs of a growing awareness and of changes taking place.

According to sources in the hospitality sectors, this summer on the Catalan coast, locals have started having dinner earlier than usual, something that our European neighbours have been doing for a long time when here on holidays.

This is a good beginning, as it allows families to have more time to spend together enjoying cultural activities. Obviously, the cultural events that abound in our country also help, as in some way people realise they need to have dinner earlier, so as to be in time for shows they might want to go to and to anticipate timetables of other events.

However, the great stumbling block that remains, and the most difficult one to overcome in the timetable reform project, is prime time television. Without the cooperation of private and public broadcasters to make the necessary changes in their programming, the reform project will not succeed. The perfect example is the programming of many televised football matches, which take us in exactly the opposite direction we want to go.

We have already made a number of advances, but there is still much to be done.