Learning from Wales’ Future Generations Commissioner

Over the last decade, Scotland has emerged as one of the leaders in the international wellbeing movement. In May, Wales’ First Future Generations Commissioner, Sophie Howe, visited Edinburgh. The visit offered an opportunity for MSPs, civil servants, and others working on wellbeing policy in Scotland to learn from her experience.

With a Wellbeing and Sustainable Development Bill on the cards for Scotland, this paper provides an overview of the key learning from the visit, along with answers to some of the questions about what this kind of legislation would look like, in practice.

In taking this bill forward, it is clear that Scotland would have an invaluable opportunity to learn from the successful experience of a Future Generations Act and Commissioner in Wales, and to use this to develop world-leading legislation that gives Government and public bodies the tools to put the wellbeing of citizens, now and in the future, at the heart of their decisions.