But the legislation lacks teeth \u2013 Walker doesn\u2019t have the power to take forceful action if public bodies are not adequately planning for the future.<\/p>\n
Big Issue founder Lord John Bird<\/a> tried to introduce a future generations commissioner in England with more robust legal powers through a private member\u2019s bill. There was also talk of future generations commissioner being appointed in Scotland in the days of the Bute House Agreement and Patrick Harvie.<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n Both attempts fell short but that hasn\u2019t stopped Wales\u2019 model being eyed by the rest of the world.<\/p>\n Walker says there has been interest from Ireland from Belfast to Dublin as well as India, while there is legislation ongoing in Australia.<\/p>\n The United Nations also agreed a declaration on future generations while the European Union has a commissioner for intergenerational fairness inspired by Wales\u2019 work.<\/p>\n \u201cActually, there is quite a lot of interest in the legislation. It\u2019s very much a soft superpower for Wales,\u201d says Walker.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI was bowled over by the level of interest in this legislation when I came in. People will take it in different ways so they might not end up with a commissioner, or they might not end up with a Future Generations Act, but they will learn from the Welsh model and understand how it could be implemented in their context. And that\u2019s good to see. There needs to be a future generations commissioner in every country, in my view, and we\u2019re not there yet.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s flattering, of course, that people are interested around the world but it\u2019s got to make a difference here. That\u2019s the most important thing. We\u2019ve got to make it work here so we can share our learning. It\u2019s not working perfectly here so we need to do all we can to make sure it makes a difference for people here as well as for the long-term and that\u2019s got to be where my focus is.\u201d<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Walker is calling on the Welsh government to carry out a post-legislative review into how the Wellbeing of Future Generations Act<\/a> functions now it is a decade old.<\/p>\n He wants to make it easier for individuals and community groups in Wales to challenge public bodies\u2019 decisions to make sure they look to the future adequately.<\/p>\n The commissioner\u2019s report calls for every public body to lay out how it will achieve real Living Wage<\/a> accreditation in a bid to tackle poverty. Ring-fenced prevention funding should be introduced and a national food resilience plan has also been proposed.<\/p>\n His performance will be judged by an unusual audience.<\/p>\n \u201cI mean, clearly you can\u2019t ask people who are not yet born,\u201d says Walker with a smile, when asked how he ensures he is acting in their best interest. \u201cBut you do it in a number of ways. One of the ways is you seek to involve everyone because one of the five ways of working in the legislation is the involvement principle.\u00a0<\/p>\n He adds: \u201cI have a stake in the future. I want the right thing for my kids and my grandkids. Young people clearly have a longer trajectory, but we\u2019ve all got a stake in the future. Young people are at the heart of this agenda but it\u2019s not a young person\u2019s agenda so involving everyone to understand the Wales we want for tomorrow is what I do on a day-to-day basis.\u201d<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n In the short-term, Walker\u2019s focus is on next year\u2019s Senedd elections.<\/p>\n The role is meant to stand against the short-termism<\/a> t<\/a>hat has dominated UK politics<\/a> in recent times.<\/p>\n Wales has gone through three first ministers in the space of a couple of years while Westminster\u2019s revolving door and inter-party squabbling has also had an impact.<\/p>\n The future generations commissioner produced the report ahead of the elections to advise parties to look to the long-term in their manifestos rather than looking to score quick political points.<\/p>\n \u201cA big part of my job this year is to speak to political parties, share my advice and hopefully they pick it up and it will be represented in their manifestos and subsequently in whoever forms the government,\u201d says Walker.<\/p>\n \u201cMy experience is politicians of all parties get the need to act for the long term and understand this clearly. It\u2019s not without controversy. It\u2019s common sense that we want to avoid sticking plaster solutions, that we want to make the right decision and it\u2019s going to be the right decision for years to come because that\u2019s going to be cheaper and more effective if we do that. We\u2019ve got to keep finding ways of achieving that.\u201d<\/p>\n Advertising helps fund Big Issue\u2019s mission to end poverty<\/p>\n Promises are easy to break. Sign\u00a0Big Issue\u2019s petition for a Poverty Zero law<\/a>\u00a0and help us make tackling poverty a legal requirement, not just a policy priority.<\/strong><\/p>\n Do you have a story to tell or opinions to share about this?\u00a0Get in touch and tell us more<\/a>.\u00a0Big Issue exists to give homeless and marginalised people the opportunity to earn an income.\u00a0To support our work buy a copy of the magazine<\/a>\u00a0or get the app from the\u00a0App Store<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0Google Play<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt\u2019s got to matter to people and it\u2019s got to be making a difference,\u201d says Walker. \u201cIn my…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":121473,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5010],"tags":[748,121,54161,54162,4884,285,54163,16,15,1764],"class_list":{"0":"post-121472","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wales","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-feature","10":"tag-food-poverty","11":"tag-future-generations","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-politics","14":"tag-real-living-wage","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom","17":"tag-wales"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114549326280281471","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121472\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/1664-Subs_Media_Ads_800x250.jpg\")
<\/p>\n