Ms Michelle Murphy:

Social Justice Ireland welcomes the opportunity to address the committee. The SDGs call on all nations to combine economic prosperity, social inclusion and environmental sustainability. Through our annual sustainable progress index, Social Justice Ireland has been tracking our progress annually since we adopted the SDGs in 2015. This index measures our progress across all 17 SDGs and compares us against 14 comparable EU countries. My opening statement and the bulk of our submission document are based on the findings of our 2024 report.

We assess Ireland's performance on each individual SDG and we create an overall ranking. We also divide each SDG into three indices, which are environmental, economic and social. We look at our progress through these three lenses and highlight the areas where we are making progress, areas where we are stagnating and areas where we need to implement new policy goals. In terms of Ireland's overall ranking in 2024, we came eighth out of 14 comparable EU countries. In the economic index we came ninth overall out of 14, on the social index we came seventh, which is in the middle of the ranking, and on the environment index we come towards the bottom of the ranking in 11th place. The economic index comprises SDG 8 on decent work and economic growth and SDG 9 on industry and innovation infrastructure.

The society index has eight SDGs, including no poverty, zero hunger, good health and well-being, gender equality and quality education, while the environment index comprises seven SDGs, including those relating to clean water and sanitation, responsible consumption and affordable and clean energy.

In terms of Ireland's strengths overall, we are doing well in some areas. We should acknowledge that progress and look at building on it, as well as at how we might apply where we are making progress to some of the other SDGs. We are in the top five for quality education, peace and justice and sustainable cities and communities. The latter means we have a relatively safe quality of life in our cities and communities. We perform very well and rank first in terms of quality education from basic education upwards. One area we should pay attention to is adult participation in lifelong learning but, overall, we perform very well there as well as in terms of sustainable cities and communities, which shows that we do offer a good quality of life for people. In comparison with the other 14 countries, we compare quite well in terms of air quality.

There are some weaknesses in the system and areas in which we are not making progress. We are in the bottom five for seven SDGs, including those relating to zero hunger, gender equality, clean water and sanitation, affordable and clean energy, industry, innovation and infrastructure, responsible consumption and production and the partnership for the goals. Several of those obviously reflect environmental concerns. Even though we are making progress on delivering some of our programmes and policies, much more could be done, particularly around energy. Some people might find the score on zero hunger surprising, but when one is measuring that SDG in this context, one is looking at things like obesity, food prices, and the sustainability of our agricultural and food production systems which really brings down our score.

For the rest of the SDGs, we are in the middle of the rankings. These SDGs include good jobs and economic growth, reduced inequalities, climate action, life below water, life on land. While we are in the middle of the ranking, there is certainly scope for improvement and we should not become complacent because the proportion of the indicators that are progressing too slowly or not really changing from year to year is concerning. Also, in terms of data on progress that we can collect and measure, in some areas we need to look at more data for some of the indicators to really determine how we are doing, particularly for life below water, for example.

We are at the midpoint of the 2030 agenda now. While we are marking some progress, much more needs to be done. We need to look at those areas that are really dragging down our performance. One way that could deliver progress in terms of progressing the SDGs is linking them to the 11 dimensions of the well-being framework which is part of how we measure the budget, both in terms of social impact and well-being. The 17 SDGs complement the well-being framework. Linking them would lead to more policy coherence. They would mutually reinforce each other going forward, looking at how we can promote both our national targets and our international commitments. Ultimately, it is coherent policy-making and investment that will lead to improved outcomes in the final five years of agenda 2030 and lead to Ireland actually achieving what we have set out to do in the context of the sustainable development goals.