Jane Hutt, Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Trefnydd and Chief Whip
I am issuing this statement alongside laying the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales’s Future Generations Report 2025 (“FG Report”), a statutory report under Section 23 of the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 (“the Act”). In issuing this response I would like to thank the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales (“the Commissioner”) and his team for their thorough, robust and informed report. The FG Report was built into the architecture of the Act as an essential accountability mechanism which will drive Wales towards achieving the national well-being goals. I urge all public bodies and Public Services Boards (“PSBs”) to fully engage with the Commissioner when responding to the report’s findings and recommendations.
On 20 March 2025 I attended the Light Up the Future event in the Temple of Peace in Cardiff. This event was one of a series of activities and events delivered as part of the Welsh Government led national plan for marking the 10th anniversary of the Act. While the event recognised the many areas of success over the last ten years, and looked forward to the future of the Act, much more can and should be done to achieve our well-being goals. On 29 April I also attended a public bodies leaders forum at the Future Generations Action Summit at the National Museum. At the forum I was encouraged to see leaders from across the Welsh public sector showing individual leadership and ingenuity in using the Act as the empowering tool it is.
The Commissioner’s FG Report provides an important landmark towards better implementation of Wales’s well-being commitment.
The FG Report provides:
- An assessment of progress on the Act;
- Targeted advice to the Welsh Government, public bodies and PSBs in the form of 50 recommendations; and
- Examples of change already happening through public services.
The FG Report highlights the significant progress Wales has made in many areas of policy while emphasising where our well-being goals are not being fully achieved. The Commissioner has decided to focus his findings and recommendations on the seven missions and areas of focus in his Cymru Can Strategy.
I am pleased to set out our initial response to the findings and recommendations made in the Commissioner’s FG Report. It provides an overview in response to each of the Commissioner’s Cymru Can missions and areas of focus. Alongside all public bodies subject to the Act, the Welsh Ministers will be considering each of the recommendations in more detail over the autumn and will be positively engaging with the Commissioner and his team to progress the recommendations.
Implementation and Impact
Over the past decade, the Act has transformed how Welsh public sector bodies prioritise the wellbeing of both people and planet. The FG Report demonstrates the shift in how Welsh Government and public bodies operate, leading to the creation of dedicated sustainable development teams and new decision-making processes aligned with the five ways of working. In relation to the Welsh Government this is highlighted in the delivery of key policies on transport, the circular economy, socially responsible procurement and more.
However, there are areas where advancements must be made to improve the implementation of the Act. I recognise the call for post-legislative evaluation of the Act and acknowledge the recent call for this in the Future Generations Report and the Auditor General’s statutory report “No time to lose: Lessons from our work under the Well-being of Future Generations Act”. In the Autumn, I will consider a report on the first stage of an evaluation of the Act by an Economic and Social Research Council policy fellow and when it concludes, the findings of the post-legislative inquiry into the Act by the Senedd’s Equality and Social Justice Committee (ESJ).
My officials are engaged with colleagues from key delivery partners, including colleagues from the Office of the Future Generations Commissioner, to embed improvements to PSBs identified through Public Health Wales’ Shaping Places for Well-being in Wales (SPWW) programme. This includes further embedding the 5 Ways-of-Working in PSBs and increasing their systemic understanding of the Act and its application.
Continuous Learning and Improvement Plan
In the Welsh Government arrangements to promote sustainable development are delivered through WG2025, our three-year programme for organisational development. Through WG2025 we are putting the sustainable development principle of the Act at the heart of how we behave and everything we do. In February 2023, the Welsh Government’s Well-being of Future Generations Continuous Learning and Improvement Plan 2023-25 (“CLIP”) was published. This brought together over 50 actions that are designed to deepen the understanding and application of the sustainable development principle in Welsh Government. We believe that our approach sends an important signal to other public bodies in Wales that the Well-being of Future Generations agenda requires continuous improvement and reflection.
In May 2024, the Welsh Government published a progress update on the CLIP which demonstrated that we have completed 18 of the actions in the original CLIP, while another 15 have been embedded into our everyday processes. The remaining 17 actions are at various stages of progress. Some of the notable actions completed are:
- Working with the Commissioner to create Hwb Dyfodol which will build expertise and capacity in foresight and futures thinking and raise awareness of the Future Trends Report across Wales.
- Launching Welsh Government’s Policy Capability Framework which will support officials and others in their application of the Act.
- Working with the Commissioner, Open University and others to create Ti, Fi a Dyfodol Cymru / You, Me and the Future of Wales which will help everyone in Wales learn how they can play an active part in creating the Wales we want.
Climate and Nature
The Welsh Government’s declaration of a climate emergency in April 2019 and the Senedd’s declaration of a nature emergency in 2021 acknowledged the need to urgently address climate change and a decline in our biodiversity. Whilst tangible progress towards targets has been made, there remains a pressing need to accelerate action and to ensure everyone is brought along on this journey.
Biodiversity
The Deputy First Minister introduced the Environment (Principles, Governance and Biodiversity Targets) (Wales) Bill into the Senedd on 2 June 2025. The Bill introduces a target setting framework which includes requirements to evaluate, monitor and report on progress. The Welsh Ministers will be required to prepare detailed plans outlining the actions they intend to take to achieve the targets, ensuring transparency and accountability.
In setting targets, the Welsh Ministers must be satisfied that meeting the targets will contribute to halting and reversing the decline in biodiversity, in particular through increasing the abundance of native species, enhancing the resilience of ecosystems or increasing genetic diversity.
River Restoration
Building on advice from the Commissioner, the Deputy First Minister has expanded the focus of the previously River Summits to encompass water quality more broadly. The first Summit, held in May 2025, focused on water company investment, sustainable drainage and nature-based solutions. The next Summit, in September 2025, will focus on agriculture and land use.
Welsh Government has confirmed funding for Nutrient Management Boards for 2025/26 enabling them to implement the delivery plans they have developed, responding to the specific issues facing each river.
Sustainable Investment
The Welsh Government is developing a new approach to sustainable finance for nature’s recovery. This approach is intended to increase and diversify the funding available so that we can effectively tackle the nature emergency and the pressures that drive biodiversity loss – including climate change, pollution, and unsustainable management of natural resources. Increasing the scale and pace of action to tackle biodiversity loss will require both increasing and diversifying the funding available. This will include funding from the private sector, community-led initiatives and philanthropic giving.
Following the consultation on Sustainable Investment Principles, the Welsh Government will, following analysis of the responses, collaborate to develop a nature finance strategy. Initially, the Welsh Government plans to conduct a series of pilot projects to gather further insight as to how private investment can support nature recovery and Net Zero.
Recognising the need for additional capacity in this space we are funding a post within Bannau Brycheiniog National Park to develop investment ready proposals. We are also funding a programme manager for MARINE Fund Cymru which will seek to invest in programmes and projects that enable, maintain and enhance the resilience of marine and coastal ecosystems.
Local Renewable Energy
The Welsh Government supports renewable and low carbon energy projects that are developed by wholly Wales-based organisations, including community groups, or provide proportionate benefit to the host community or Wales as a whole. Locally owned generation provides a strong opportunity to retain economic value, contributing to prosperity. Our “Local Ownership of Energy Generation” policy was published in 2020 and sits alongside our targets for locally owned generation. We have also made good progress towards our ambitious target of at least 1.5 GW of renewable energy capacity to be locally owned by 2035.
To support communities and developers to embrace renewable energy the Welsh Government provided guidance in the Local and Shared Ownership of Energy Projects in Wales. Additionally, the Welsh Government Energy Service, Ynni Cymru and Community Energy Wales supports commercial developers working together with community-based organisations to take forward projects on a shared ownership basis.
Ynni Cymru recently closed their application window for the 2025-26 scheme and will be working to award £10million in grants to support local energy schemes in the coming year.
To complement our support and action in the community space, the Welsh Government announced in 2024 the setting up of Trydan Gwyrdd Cymru, an energy developer in Wales established to accelerate the development of renewable energy projects, particularly onshore wind, on the wider Welsh public estate and maximise their value for the people of Wales.
The recently published Welsh Government Energy Service Impact Report showed that 8 community solar PV projects were supported by the energy service to financial close in 2024/25. This included 1.59MW of new community solar PV projects with lifetime carbon savings of 4,250 tonnes of CO2. Since 2018, the energy service has supported 44 projects for community organisations and 9 projects for community councils.
Health and Well-Being
I welcome the FG Report’s focus on the importance of shifting to a prevention-focused health system and addressing health inequalities, including through improving action on the wider determinants of health and working in partnership across the public sector. This focus reflects the direction and priorities set out in A Healthier Wales, our overarching strategy for health and social care in Wales.
Wales is a nation already committed to improving health and addressing health inequalities. This commitment is demonstrated through health equity being embedded as a structural component of our legislative and strategic frameworks including the Act but also the Socio-economic duty and our ‘health in all policies’ approach. Despite this much envied framework, too many people die too early from conditions and diseases, which could be prevented. And too many years of healthy life expectancy are being lost to disease and disability.
To support our efforts to address health inequalities, the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care announced at the end of March that we will work with Professor Sir Michael Marmot’s Institute of Health Equity to become the world’s first Marmot Nation. In practice this will mean working with a number of communities across Wales to reduce health inequalities using the Marmot principles, in the same way Torfaen has so successfully done since Gwent became a Marmot region. We welcome the support for this initiative as part of the FG Report’s recommendations.
In addition, we also intend to lay regulations in the autumn to mandate the use of health impact assessments in certain circumstances by public bodies, strengthening our health-in-all policies approach. Health Impact Assessments reinforce that preventing ill health is not just the job of the NHS, it must be at the heart of all our services and embedded across strategies and plans. The building blocks for good health include having enough money in our pockets, fair work, a good education, and a safe and warm home.
Within the NHS, population health and prevention is a key priority in the NHS Planning Framework for 2025-28 and an area that NHS Performance and Improvement is expected to focus on. This focus includes demonstrating how the NHS has embedded and driven forward work to prevent ill-health, ensuring that prevention interventions are embedded in its planning, quality statements and clinical network developments and demonstrating with the data and evidence available, a shift towards preventative measures in the delivery of NHS care.
We recognise that preventing ill-health is also about reducing some of the big risk factors associated with long-term health conditions and disease – smoking, alcohol, a diet high in fat, sugar and salt and a lack of exercise. Of these the FG Report rightly highlights the need to halt the rise in obesity which has been rising steadily over many years.
Our Healthy Weight, Healthy Wales Strategy is our long-term strategy to tackle obesity and overweight in Wales, as articulated in the Public Health (Wales) Act 2017. It is supported by a series of biennial delivery plans, the next of which is due to be published in 2025.
The focus of the strategy is to make the healthy choice the easy choice, but it also recognises that many of the reasons for our levels of overweight and obesity are complex, societal and will take wide scale system change to embed.
Evidence of what works in other parts of the world shows that turning the obesity curve at a population level is a mammoth task, which needs widescale change across society and will take a long time to embed. The next delivery plan will target action and resources at the start of life, towards children and young people, through a whole system approach at national and community levels, to elicit real results that last the life course and embed good, healthy habits into adulthood.
Culture and Welsh Language
The Welsh Government recently published Priorities for Culture. This document, acknowledged in an Oral Statement made by the Minister for Culture, Skills and Social Partnership on 20 May 2025, recognised the importance of the Act in improving the cultural well-being of the people of Wales. Launching the 'Priorities for Culture' provides a renewed impetus and focus for the mid-to-long term future of the cultural sector. The Welsh Government have allocated £15 million to support the delivery of these new priorities, including £8 million for an arts sector strategic capital investment programme.
Community Assets
Community assets can play a significant role in empowering communities across Wales. The Welsh Government has established the Community Asset Commission to review the current system of community asset transfer. The Commission will present its report and make recommendations to the Cabinet Secretary for Housing and Local Government in the autumn 2025. The findings and recommendations from the Commission, as well as the findings in the FG Report, will inform our approach to realising the potential for community assets in Wales. The work of the Commission includes considering the role that Community Right to Buy legislation can play in Wales, and whilst we await the views of the Commission, we recognise that legislation has the potential to play a significant important role.
Ystadau Cymru published a Community Assets Transfer Best Practice Guide which contains a due diligence guide, a practical example of the transfer process, and real-life case studies. The guidance will be reviewed and updated, following receipt of the Commission’s recommendations.
Cymraeg in the Welsh Government and Public Bodies
As demonstrated in the FG Report, the use of Welsh in the workplace is vital to the viability of the language across Wales. Aim 6 of Cymraeg 2050, our Welsh language strategy, outlines our vision and strategy to support workplaces to provide opportunities to use, practice and learn Welsh. Welsh Language Standards (“standards”) play an important part in ensuring that public bodies offer more opportunities for their staff to use Welsh at work. Standards, alongside guidance provided by the Welsh Language Commissioner, have supported public bodies to improve the way they plan their bilingual workforce and provide more opportunities for staff to acknowledge, use, and enhance their Welsh language skills.
In addition, the Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Act 2025 places a duty on Welsh Ministers to set targets in its Welsh language strategy for increasing the use of Welsh in the workplace and requires Welsh Ministers to conduct a review of standards which are specified under section 26 of the Welsh Language (Wales) Measure 2011. The review will consider whether any of the standards relating to improving or assessing the Welsh language skills of the workforce or Welsh language promotion standards need to be amended to facilitate meeting targets set in the Welsh language strategy, including targets set to increase the use of Welsh in the workplace.
Volunteering
The Welsh Government recognises the importance of volunteering and providing opportunities to all those who wish to volunteer. The nature of volunteering is changing which is why the Welsh Government have been working with the public, private and third sector to develop a New Approach to Volunteering. This new approach will have three elements – a vision, framework and implementation plan. Two of these three elements were unveiled at Gofod3 in July 2025 to make up the “New Approach to Volunteering – the Vision and Delivery Framework” tool.
From the work we have undertaken we know that to create an enabling environment for volunteering and the organisations who work with volunteers we will need to ensure strong leadership; supportive policies and policy levers, good infrastructure; and robust governance and partnerships. The Implementation Plan will detail the needs in these areas and suggestions for improvement in the short, medium and long-term, and the role Welsh Government will play in helping deliver them including the contribution it will make in a shift to a wellbeing economy.
A Well-being Economy
Our vision is a well-being economy which drives prosperity, is environmentally sound, and helps everyone realise their potential. It is rooted in our existing economic action plan, Prosperity for all, with its progressive purposes of reducing inequality and spreading wealth and well-being across all of Wales.
Real Living Wage
We have worked with specific sectors to encourage adoption of the Real Living Wage. This has included social care, where we have delivered on our Programme for Government commitment to pay registered social care workers and personal assistants the Real Living Wage, and the retail sector, where we have worked through our Retail Forum to explore barriers to the Real Living Wage and raise awareness of its benefits.
We also collaborate with Cynnal Cymru, the Real Living Wage accreditation partner in Wales, providing them with annual funding. This support enhances their capacity to engage with employers, including public bodies. The number of Real Living Wage accredited employers in Wales has continued to grow year on year.
In relation to public bodies, in December 2024, the First Minister wrote to all public bodies in Wales, encouraging them to consider the benefits of adopting the Real Living Wage and becoming a Real Living Wage accredited employer. This follows similar correspondence issued in previous years.
We expect organisations in Wales that receive public funding, including public bodies, to sign up to the Code of Practice on Ethical Employment in Supply Chains. The Code includes 12 commitments, one of which is for signatory organisations to consider paying the Real Living Wage and becoming a Real Living Wage accredited organisation.
Social Business Sector
Supporting social businesses across Wales to develop and grow is a key aim of the Welsh Government. Social enterprises and community-led cooperatives are an important part of the social and economic landscape in Wales. Community-based organisations provide good quality job opportunities, support local economies and in many cases safeguard community assets and vital services. The Welsh Government has historically supported social enterprises as part of its broader goals around inclusive growth, community resilience, and sustainability through programmes such as the Social Business Wales and Social Investment Cymru. Mapping shows that in 2022 there were just over 2,800 Social Enterprises in Wales, employing around 65,000 people, an increase of 22% from 2020.
The Welsh Government funds support for social enterprises through Business Wales. Business Wales can help improve supply chains and works with public sector purchasers to enable businesses in Wales to secure a greater proportion of public sector spend and provides procurement advice to assist businesses, particularly in foundational economy, grounded firms, and business clusters, to bid for contracts in the public and private sector.
The FG Report has two recommendations on the social business sector – to set a target to double the size of the social business sector in Wales by 2035 and to support social enterprises in expanding into public and private sector supply chains. The report notes that taking these approaches will achieve the Commissioner’s ambition of achieving the national well-being goals as it would promote long-term thinking, community cohesion, and inclusive economic growth. Doubling the sector could create thousands of jobs, increase community ownership of assets, drive innovation in public service delivery and contribute to net-zero goals through green social enterprises. Practically, there are clear advantages including co-operatives and social enterprises reinvesting their profits locally, providing stable employment and encouraging social enterprises to enter public and private supply chains, reducing reliance on large, non-local suppliers and fostering innovation and ethical procurement.
In April, Welsh Government published a new Mission Statement in relation to our activities in the Foundational Economy. This responded to stakeholder feedback and clarifies our aims, actions and activities to ensure a fair and prosperous economy throughout the country. Our focus is on those sectors of the economy that provide the goods and services that underpin everyday life. These include care and health services (including social care and childcare), management of social housing, construction of residential and commercial buildings, energy and utilities, food, high street retail and services, tourism, and public transport.
The Foundational Economy is integral to our economic mission - growing and strengthening it is a Programme for Government commitment. By its nature, it is very cross-cutting, not only across government and the wider public sector, but across businesses and the life of every citizen in Wales, touching upon all seven of the wellbeing goals.
The Mission Statement outlines the importance of the people who work in these sectors, the goods and services they provide and the economic and social relationships that underpin them. It also sets out our Foundational Economy objectives of boosting jobs and ensuring fair pay; increasing ‘household liveability’ and universal access to high quality foundational goods and services; building local supply chains; helping with decarbonisation and encouraging collaborative innovation through social enterprises, co-operatives and community-owned projects.
We are also working on a set of metrics as part of the Mission Statement which will be published in due course. These will help us build a picture and measure improvement across the Foundational Economy as a whole, and in key sectors and includes metrics around jobs, sector growth, fair work and skills.
Skills for a Just Transition
The Welsh Government published its Net Zero Skills Action Plan in 2023 which sets out 7 key areas of action. Since then, we have worked with our partners and stakeholders to map the skills needs of key sectors and consulted on Emissions Sector skills summaries and Roadmaps to help us understand the pace and scale of change needed to support a Green Welsh economy. We are using our Regional Skills Partnerships to gain understanding of the challenges and opportunities across Wales and are working across Government to develop clear net zero career pathways.
The Welsh Government is working with Medr to explore opportunities to make the qualifications and skills system more responsive to the dynamic challenges of supporting Net Zero industries by improving post-16 outcomes as well as advancing equity and equality of opportunity.
Our National Occupational Standards (NOS) set out the knowledge, skills and competencies that are required for an occupation and underpin a range of apprenticeship qualifications and adult vocational qualifications across the UK and overseas. The NOS Strategy refers to responding to the green recovery agenda as one of its key priorities.
Artificial Intelligence
The Welsh Government believes that Artificial Intelligence (“AI”) is creating significant benefits for the economy, public services, and ultimately wider society in Wales. We have developed a set of principles to help guide the responsible use of AI so that it is:
- ethical, trustworthy, and aligned with the values and interests of the people of Wales;
- inclusive, accessible, and beneficial for everyone; innovative, collaborative and supportive of our Research and Development ecosystem; and,
- transparent, accountable, and subject to the right governance and oversight.
To support this and ensure the responsible and ethical use of AI across sectors in Wales, the Workforce Partnership Council has published guidance to support public sector employers on how to adopt these new technologies. The guidance endorses the principles of taking a social partnership approach, preserving human oversight and interaction, ensuring Fair Work for all, building capability to manage AI systems, and protecting jobs. Building on this, the Social Partnership Council has started considering how to develop an AI literate and skilled workforce.
Repairs and Re-Use Hubs
The Welsh Government has two directly related Programme for Government Commitments on repair and re-use hubs. These are to “develop community recycling facilities in town centres and promote repair and re-use facilities to encourage zero-waste shopping” and “Support 80 re-use and repair hubs in town centres.”
Repair and reuse facilities have been established in 18 of the 22 local authorities, and funding has been approved this year for the remaining four. There are 130 repair cafes operational across Wales with support provided by Repair Cafe Wales through Welsh Government funding. The majority of these are in town centres of hubs of community activity, with easy access by public transport. We have also funded Benthyg Cymru to support 30 Libraries of Things where members of the public can hire items at a nominal fee rather than buying new.
This work is helping to revitalise town centres. Aberdare, Flintshire and Newport offer examples of working in partnership with regeneration teams to repurpose empty towns and city centre shops which have been renovated and turned into vibrant repair and reuse hubs.
Food
Community Food Strategy
Through the Community Food Strategy, the Welsh Government sets out the ambition to build local food resilience through collaborative partnerships. These will enable a better informed and joined-up approach for food related planning and delivery within Welsh communities. This will help us maximise the potential for locally sourced food to contribute to social, economic, environmental and cultural well-being. It will encourage preventative approaches for key food related issues, such as food poverty and diet related ill-health. The strategy sets an objective to maximise the potential benefits of community growing and local horticulture. We want to deliver year on year growth in the availability and diversity of locally sourced horticultural produce and to create new local food supply chain relationships for community growers and farmers. Through the strategy, the Welsh Government will work closely with the Commissioner to help public bodies and PSBs understand how to drive the food agenda, adopt long-term systems for local food resilience and integrate food policies within their well-being plans.
The Welsh Government has committed to funding of over £2m in 2025-26 to further develop the network of Local Food Partnerships across Wales and deliver community food projects. In addition, the Welsh Government has committed to resource these partnerships until the end of March 2028.
Food Matters: Wales
Food Matters: Wales, published in July 2024, demonstrates our collective, cross-government actions and joined-up approach to food policy. It links our key priorities relating to food and drink in Wales across ministerial portfolios. It was constructed using our cross-Government Food Forum which significantly contributes to our integrated and holistic development of food policy, in line with the sustainable development principle.
Free School Meals and Welsh Veg in Schools Programme
Wales leads the UK in providing free school meals to all primary school children. This important step helps tackle child poverty, supports learning, and contributes towards improved health in schools across Wales. Children who eat well learn better, feel better, and grow stronger. With children spending about 40% of their waking hours in schools, healthier school food can shape lifelong eating habits and reduce health inequalities.
However, Welsh children are not eating enough fruit and vegetables, with children from poorer households eating the least. That is why the Welsh Government are updating our food and nutritional standards for primary schools to align with the latest dietary recommendations, helping every Welsh child develop healthy eating habits that last a lifetime. We are currently consulting on proposed amendments to the existing Healthy Eating in Schools Regulations and in relation to vegetables, we're proposing to increase portions from one to two per day in primary school meals, alongside a greater variety of vegetables weekly to encourage healthier choices. The draft proposals set out that at least six different vegetable varieties must be provided weekly, and at least four different fruit varieties. Further to this, our draft statutory guidance supports caterers to deliver compliant school food and encourages the use of seasonal vegetables where possible.
The outcomes of our Foundational Economy funded food projects show an increase in locally sourced food on school menus, with Welsh suppliers reporting significant growth in products distributed to schools.
The Foundational Economy funded project ‘Welsh Veg in Schools’ has seen growers working with the wholesaler, Castell Howell, to develop 8 new growers supplying around 10 tonnes of organic vegetables to schools in 6 Local Authorities, resulting in local sales of over £100,000, which would otherwise be going outside of Wales. This activity is being ramped up and expanded during 2025/26 to include more growers, wholesalers and Local Authorities.
The work by Larder Cymru to review school menus and make switches to include more sustainable and seasonal Welsh food has resulted in Caerphilly Council almost doubling the amount it spends on Welsh produce.
Budget Setting for Future Generations
Budget Improvement Plan
The Welsh Government agrees that we should work to minimise funding uncertainties, and that the Welsh Government fully considers the funding uncertainties related to the current budget setting process. However, this must be subject to the specific constraints in which we operate. The timing of UK Fiscal events, the UK Government election cycle and the Senedd election cycle all have significant impact on our ability to deliver multi-year settlements.
The Welsh Government Budget Improvement Plan sets out our vision to improve the Welsh Government’s budget process using the WFG Act and the five ways of working to drive continuous improvement.
To support the Welsh Government in the development of long-term ambitions we draw on the expertise of the Budget Improvement and Impact Advisory Group (BIIAG), alongside a range of experts and other governments. The aim of this Group is to provide expert advice on how to implement improvements to our budget and tax processes in line with our Budget Improvement Plan.
Preventative Budgeting
The Welsh Government is committed to exploring a preventive approach where possible in its budget processes and spending plans. We have worked with the Commissioner’s office to establish a commonly understood, clear definition of prevention. We remain committed to working closely with the Budget Improvement and Impact Advisory Group to improve how we apply and reflect the WFG Act within our preparation for Draft Budgets.
The Welsh Government welcomes the continued dialogue with the Senedd Finance Committee and our stakeholders to identify and agree what actions and which elements of funding should be deemed as preventative.
There is a longstanding principle that the Welsh Government avoids hypothecating funding as this can reduce the ability of institutions to manage their own budgets in line with their responsibilities. It is challenging to effectively and equitably isolate funding for prevention and early intervention without undermining the broader approach to prevention. There needs to be a balance between the immediate provision of services and being able to plan long term to prevent the need for those services to be accessed.
The Future is Now
Hwb Dyfodol and Futures Champions
Earlier this year the Welsh Government, alongside partners in the Office of the Future Generations Commissioner and public bodies, launched Hwb Dyfodol. Hwb Dyfodol is a new multi-stakeholder group set up to build skills in long-term thinking. It has prioritised involvement across sectors and multiple generations and it is working to unlock ideas and solutions that will lead to integrated and preventative long-term action across our public bodies. Hwb Dyfodol was launches at the Light Up the Future Event in Cardiff on 20 March, which celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Act.
The Welsh Government is a leading partner in the creation and application of Hwb Dyfodol and as such is a core member of this governance structure with dedicated resource to deliver this function. Currently, this resource has focussed on the formation of Hwb Dyfodol but will now incorporate the “Futures Champion” function as well.
Additionally, the Welsh Government has an alumni network of 17 young officials who have graduated the Future Generations Leadership Academy. The Academy, run by the Office of the Future Generations Commissioner, has provided Welsh Government officials with the skills and knowledge to embed the Act and futures thinking into Welsh Government day-to-day working practices.
One Welsh Public Service
The Welsh Government has set out its vision for One Welsh Public Service. One Welsh Public Service is about improving the economic, social, environmental and cultural well-being to help us create a Wales that we want to live in now and in the future. We want to work together across sectors to share expertise, streamline processes and maximise opportunities for delivering for Wales. There are dedicated teams within the Welsh Government whose role is to support specific areas of the public sector workforce as they navigate the impact of a changing world.
Future Trends Report
In 2026 the Welsh Government will be publishing its Future Trends Report 2026. This report is a statutory duty under the Act and brings together social, economic, environmental and cultural trends affecting Wales, its people and communities in an integrated way. The Future Trends Report 2026 will build on the first and second statutory Future Trends Reports in 2016 and 2021. This next statutory report will need to improve the awareness and accessibility of the resource, update the data and content; focus on the use and application of the resource; and explore what the policy implications are for Wales.