Dr. Larry O'Connell:

I thank the Chairman and members of the committee for the invitation to NESC to speak about the recent work we have done on just transition. NESC is a Government body that advises the Taoiseach on strategic policy issues. The members are appointed by the Taoiseach and represent businesses, employers, trade unions, agricultural and farming organisations, community and voluntary organisations and environmental organisations. As well as that, heads of Departments and independent experts sit on NESC. Its composition means it plays an important and unique role in bringing different perspectives from civil society together with Government. Dr. Jeanne Moore and I are secretariats to NESC and are attending today's meeting in that capacity.

The points we make today stem from a significant body of work that was produced by the council and the secretariat, primarily in 2019. The report we published at the start of this year, No. 149, was called Addressing Employment Vulnerability as Part of a Just Transition in Ireland. This work was a response to a direct request in the Future Jobs Ireland 2019 report and the climate action plan for NESC to identify steps that could be taken to address the vulnerability arising from the transition to both a low-carbon and more digital and automated future. In that work, the council has recognised that the transitions to a low-carbon and more digital, automated Ireland are extremely complex and are interconnected. There is, therefore, a significant degree of uncertainty involved. According to our research, this includes uncertainty about where and how the greatest vulnerability will fall in terms of the impact on employment. There are risks to employment from the transitions in agriculture and food, transport, and parts of industry. Despite their inherent complexity and uncertainty, there are also economic and social benefits to adopting a proactive, managed approach. There will be job losses in vulnerable sectors and within roles, but these are coupled with opportunities for new jobs and enterprises, which need to be planned for and managed. That is central to the idea of the just transition approach.

That proactive, planned approach and response was also highlighted in earlier work we did on building community engagement and social support regarding wind energy. In that work, which was done a number of years ago, we identified the importance in a very practical sense of an intentional, participatory and problem-solving State-led process to underpin transition. I will hand over to my colleague Dr. Moore to walk the committee through some of the more detailed work we have done on just transition.