LONDON (Reuters Life!) - As Britain prepares to put the clocks back this weekend, one of its leading historians has called for the UK to join the same time zone as the rest of Europe -- and leave Scotland in the dark.

On Sunday the clocks go back one hour to GMT to provide more daylight in the morning, a tradition Alistair Horne called "absolutely crazy."

"The Scots do have a problem because, being that much nearer the North Pole, they do have a very short day," Horne told the BBC's Today programme.

"But when you look at the map of time, it is absolutely crazy. European time stretches from the eastern frontier of Poland to the western frontier of Spain and the only country which is on Portuguese time is Britain."

Horne, 83, who said he was 99 percent Scottish, said the rest of the UK should not lose an hour of evening daylight just because Scottish farmers did not want to milk in the dark.

He said that the Scottish argument had traditionally been that it made it safer for children travelling to school in the morning.

However, Horne suggested more children were run over returning from school tired and in the dark and that Scotland could have its own "tundra time".