Can you please share a bit about yourself and your role in drafting the Intergenerational Fairness Strategy?
I joined the Cabinet on Intergenerational Fairness, Youth, Culture, and Sport from my previous role in the Cabinet on Democracy and Demography, which are deeply intertwined with intergenerational fairness. When you think about who gets represented in democratic systems, and how demographic shifts reshape our society, the connections are obvious and urgent. So, when the strategy was announced, it felt like a natural continuation. That said, the political lead here is firmly with the Commissioner. My role has been to help connect the dots by bringing evidence, stakeholder perspectives, and policy coherence to make sure the ambition actually lands. It's a genuine attempt to fix one of democracy's most stubborn blind spots: governing for people who don't vote yet.
When today's voters' interests conflict with those of future generations, how should the Commission weigh that trade-off?
Our systems are naturally wired to respond to the present, whereas future generations have no ballot box. In this context, the Commission's job is to make the long-term consequences of short-term decisions impossible to ignore. However, what people don’t realise is that policies that protect future generations - on climate, housing, debt - also make life better today, so it doesn’t ultimately represent a trade-off. But when real tensions exist, the principle is clear: we cannot keep exporting structural burdens to people who had no say in creating them. Good governance means asking not only what's popular now, but what's just over time.
The Intergenerational Fairness Strategy was devised through a co-design process including a dedicated European Citizens' Panel. What did the citizens' panel tell you that surprised the cabinet?
There's often an assumption that citizens will focus on immediate personal concerns. The panel discussions proved that otherwise. People from very different ages, countries, and backgrounds consistently focused on structural fairness, institutional trust, and the long-term credibility of political decisions. They talked about housing insecurity, weakening social mobility, pension sustainability - and they framed it not as young versus old, but as a shared social responsibility. The other thing that struck us was that they had zero patience for symbolic strategies. They wanted accountability mechanisms, measurable progress, and explanations when things go wrong. That insistence on implementation over intention shaped everything that followed.
What would be an example of an EU proposal that might look different because of the strategy?
The Anti-Poverty Strategy is a strong example, and at its core is something the intergenerational lens makes easier to recognise: the transmission of poverty across generations. Without it, poverty gets treated as a snapshot problem, something to be addressed in the present tense. With it, you're asking a much harder question: why does poverty reproduce itself? A child born into poverty is statistically far more likely to remain in poverty as an adult. That constitutes a policy failure we keep inheriting. A proposal shaped by the strategy places early childhood investment, access to education, and breaking cycles of deprivation at the centre, rather than the margins.
One of the strategy's concrete deliverables is an Intergenerational Fairness Index. How will the Index influence policy choices rather than become an overlooked indicator?
The risk with any index is that it becomes a beautiful dashboard nobody actually uses. Ever since the beginning, the priority has been that the dashboard remains institutionally relevant, rather than just being used for show. The objective is the usefulness of the Index in such a way that it shapes decisions before they're made, and does not just comment on them afterwards. Its job is to surface blind spots, to make sure that our policies build the capitals of the future and don’t deplete the future of opportunities. Its value added is in transforming the narrative of intergenerational fairness into something measurable and quantifiable, and in aggregating indicators to produce value added for the future.
What does success look like in 2028 when the first progress report on the Intergenerational Fairness Strategy will be submitted?
Success means the strategy has actually changed behaviour inside institutions. It means policymakers across portfolios - finance, agriculture, digital - routinely ask how their decisions affect long-term fairness. It means the Index is being used in real decisions and that younger Europeans feel that institutions aren't just talking about their future, but governing with it in mind. This entails stronger prevention-based investment, transparent debt decisions, clearer accountability on climate. But the deeper test is trust. If by 2028 people feel that Europe is planning with the next generation rather than just for the next election, then that's proof that it has worked.
When you look at Europe from 2040 or 2050, what is the intergenerational unfairness we are currently normalising that future Europeans may find hardest to forgive?
Delayed responsibility; in other words, the pattern of knowing about structural risks and still treating action as optional - because the full consequences arrive later. Climate is the obvious example, but it runs deeper: housing exclusion, weakening social mobility, unsustainable pension pressures, public debt that transfers constraints rather than opportunity. We've got comfortable with the idea that future generations will somehow innovate their way out of problems we were politically unwilling to confront. What they may find hardest to forgive is that we had the evidence, the resources, and the warning signs - and still chose to postpone. Intergenerational unfairness rarely announces itself dramatically. It hides in gradual deterioration and the quiet acceptance of lower expectations.
Is there anything else that you would like to mention?
I want to stress that intergenerational fairness isn't a niche agenda for young people. It's about the credibility of Europe itself. Europe was built on the promise that each generation can expect security, dignity, and the possibility of progress. If that promise weakens, trust in institutions weakens with it. This strategy is ultimately about whether our institutions are capable of governing with time, not just within time. If we get it right, intergenerational fairness will simply become how good policymaking is done in the long term.
