IT was a case of deja vu for clockwatchers in Huddersfield.

Public clocks across the town were all showing the wrong time – after another gaffe over British Summer Time.

The clock faces on Huddersfield railway station, Lindley Clock Tower and Marsden Mechanics Hall had all been moved back one hour – exactly a week before the end of British Summer Time.

And as several people pointed out, the authority had done exactly the same last October.

Then, council officials blamed a programming “glitch”.

A Kirklees Council spokesman said at the time it was down to a mechanical fault.

He said: “The clocks are programmed to change automatically when clocks go forward an hour in spring and back an hour in the autumn.

“Obviously there was a glitch with the programming on this particular occasion, but we will reset them so that the problem is ironed out”.

Things did not go to plan.

Peter Houghton, of Cadogan Avenue, Lindley, said: Lindley clock tower has gone back an hour a week early – again!

“That should confuse a few people on their way to work on Monday morning!”

He added: “It happened last year so why can’t they get it right?

“We residents of Lindley are getting used to it by now; perhaps we ought to organise a special festival to mark the clocks being wrong?”

Another Lindley resident said: “I don’t understand how they can get it wrong again, after the fuss of last year.

“They said there was a programming error last time around”.

In Huddersfield, people hurrying to catch trains from the railway station thought they had gained an extra hour, with the clock on the imposing station facade clearly an hour early.

One passenger said: “I just hope people don’t miss trains as a result”.

A council spokesman said yesterday: “Now we have been told of the problems, we will make sure the clocks are put right as soon as possible”.

Britain has been changing its clocks forwards and backwards since 1916.

William Willett, a London builder, of Petts Wood, Kent, campaigned for putting the clocks forward in summer, noticing light in the mornings was wasted while people slept.

The British Government finally adopted the system a year after Willett’s death.

The idea was not new. Ancient civilisations used different timescales through the year.

Modern daylight saving time was championed by English-born New Zealand entomologist George Vernon Hudson in an 1895 paper. The idea was repeatedly put before the New Zealand parliament by Sir Thomas Sidey from 1909 until adopted in 1927.

At 1am (01:00) GMT on the last Sunday in March, the UK moves its clocks forward by one hour for the start of British Summer Time.

Most European Union countries change clocks on last Sundays of March and October. Different dates are used in North America.