Ms Meaghan Carmody:

Yes. It goes back to the original definition of sustainable development, which was defined in the Brundtland commission's report in 1987 as "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs". We emphasise that this role of a future generations commissioner would need to be on a statutory footing. It would need to last between governments and must not solely be a role that would exist only for one particular government. It needs to be a long-lasting role. This person would not necessarily have the teeth to create policy but to generate an opinion and have a space to share how certain policies do or do not align with this definition of sustainable development.

Deputy Ó Cathasaigh cited Wales as an example. The former future generations commissioner for Wales, Sophie Howe, was able to give input on a plan for developing more road infrastructure for the Welsh Government. Because that specific plan did not align with their Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act, the project was scrapped. The role is therefore one person who is challenged with identifying issues to do with policy coherence, both today and into the future. In addition to the future generations commissioner, there are many positive examples from around the world, such as ministries for the future, committees for the future and ombudsmen for the future. There are many different things we could do. Ireland is in a positive space to be able to do that. We have led on many highly innovative policies in the past number of years. Very few countries have a future generations commissioner and we could be part of that vanguard. I am happy to send some follow-up information to the committee and more specific detail on that role as a project, as well as the role of this commissioner.