Dr. Larry O'Connell:

I thank Deputy Whitmore. On the question of the just transition and climate justice, we see those as being obviously connected but separate terms. It is interesting that the Deputy pointed to the example in Scotland. In that case, both are specifically referenced. That is the experience we have drawn in that context.

The Deputy's observation that some parallel process is needed to really figure out what is next on the institutional piece on just transition would resonate strongly with our own sense that we need to look at it in more detail. There had been a focus in NESC on creating a just transition review group and we did do quite a bit of work on that. We feel that lots of things have changed in terms of the work of the just transition commissioner and in the wider context of Covid now and how we think about just transition. NESC believes that it would be very helpful to do something like that and we would absolutely agree that the experience in Scotland is very valuable. We recently had a conference on just transition and people from the commission in Scotland spoke at it. They have made a lot of progress on the details of their work and the engagement they do with communities around just transition. It would be helpful to draw that experience in further.