Official Report: search what was said in Parliament
The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.
The Official Report search offers lots of different ways to find the information you’re looking for. The search is used as a professional tool by researchers and third-party organisations. It is also used by members of the public who may have less parliamentary awareness. This means it needs to provide the ability to run complex searches, and the ability to browse reports or perform a simple keyword search.
Searching by different views
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
- Report: this is the whole Official Report for a particular meeting of a committee or Parliament
- Item of business: this is each individual agenda item in an Official Report. For example, Portfolio Questions would be the item of business in a Meeting of the Parliament report
- Contribution: this is each time someone has made a spoken contribution to a meeting.
Depending on the kind of search you want to do, one of these views will be the best option. The default view is to show the report for each meeting of Parliament or a committee. For a simple keyword search, the results will be shown by item of business.
Search by MSP
When you choose to search by a particular MSP, the results returned will show each spoken contribution in Parliament or a committee, ordered by date with the most recent contributions first. This will usually return a lot of results, but you can refine your search by keyword, date and/or by meeting (committee or Chamber business).
We’ve chosen to display the entirety of each MSP’s contribution in the search results. This is intended to reduce the number of times that users need to click into an actual report to get the information that they’re looking for, but in some cases it can lead to very short contributions (“Yes.”) or very long ones (Ministerial statements, for example.) We’ll keep this under review and get feedback from users on whether this approach best meets their needs.
Searching by keyword
There are two types of keyword search:
- A keyword search without quotation marks will look for every instance of each word used and rank the results by frequency and proximity. It will also include variants of the keywords using “porter stemming”. This is when the search looks for the “stem” of a word regardless of its ending. So, for example, a search for [salmon farm] will return each instance of “salmon” and each instance of “farm” as well as potentially including results for “farms”, “farmed” and “farming”.
- A keyword search with quotation marks will only return instances of that exact phrase used. So, for example, a search for “salmon farm” in quotation marks will only return instances of that exact phrase.
Combining search filters
If you select an MSP’s name from the dropdown menu, and add a phrase in quotation marks to the keyword field, then the search will return only examples of when the MSP said those exact words. You can further refine this search by adding a date range or selecting a particular committee or Meeting of the Parliament.
More complex keyword searches
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
- a search for “salmon farm” AND “Loch Lomond” will return only results which include both exact phrases
- a search for “salmon farm” NOT “Loch Lomond” will return results for “salmon farm” but exclude results which also include “Loch Lomond”
- a search for “salmon farm” OR “Loch Lomond” will return all results for “salmon farm” and all results for “Loch Lomond” regardless of whether they appear together
Searching by date
There are two ways of searching by date.
You can either use the Start date and End date options to run a search across a particular date range. For example, you may know that a particular subject was discussed at some point in the last few weeks and choose a date range to reflect that.
Alternatively, you can use one of the pre-defined date ranges under “Select a time period”. These are:
- Current session (all Official Reports since the current sessions started)
- Last 6 months
- Last 12 months
- each of the previous sessions of Parliament. (Selecting the information icon above the “Select a time period” menu will give you the exact dates for each session.)
- All sessions
- You can also choose to select a custom date range, although adding a Start or End date will mean the search automatically defaults to this option.
If you search by an individual session, the list of MSPs and committees will automatically update to show only the MSPs and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of MSPs and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of MSPs and committees will update to show the information that was current at that time.
All Official Reports of meetings in the Debating Chamber of the Scottish Parliament.
All Official Reports of public meetings of committees.
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COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Ministerial Updates on Coronavirus Legislation and Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
The final agenda item is consideration of the evidence that we heard earlier on three negative instruments: the Coronavirus (Scotland) Act 2020 (Early Expiry of Provisions) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/214); the Coronavirus (Scotland) Act 2020 (Early Expiry of Provisions) (No 2) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/236); and the Coronavirus (Extension and Expiry) (Scotland) Act 2021 (Evidence) (Saving Provision) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/280).
As these are negative instruments, the Parliament has 40 days to consider a motion to annul them. We have taken evidence on the instruments from the Deputy First Minister and motions to annul the instruments have not been lodged.
If no member has any comment, is the committee content that this concludes our scrutiny of the negative instruments?
Members indicated agreement.
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Ministerial Updates on Coronavirus Legislation and Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
Thank you. That concludes our business. Our next meeting will be on 9 September, when we will take evidence from the Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero, Energy and Transport on international travel regulations.
Meeting closed at 11:03.COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Ministerial Updates on Coronavirus Legislation and Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
The next agenda item is consideration of motions to recommend approval of the made affirmative instruments that we have just discussed. Deputy First Minister, would you like to make any further remarks on the SSIs before we consider the motions?
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Scotland’s Strategic Framework
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
We turn to questions. I remind members that we have approximately six minutes each for questions, so it would be helpful if we could keep our questions and answers concise. If there is time for supplementaries, I will indicate that once all members have had a chance to ask questions.
I will ask the first question, which is on something that you just touched on, Deputy First Minister. The Scottish Government committed to establishing a cross-party steering group on Covid recovery, which met before the summer. What role do you see the steering group playing, and how will that differ from the role of this committee?
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Ministerial Updates on Coronavirus Legislation and Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
Are members content for motions S6M-00695, S6M-00694, S6M-00693, S6M-00692, S6M-00702, S6M-00701 and S6M-00901 to be moved en bloc?
Members indicated agreement.
Motions moved,
That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions and Requirements) (Local Levels) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 27) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/238) be approved.
That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions and Requirements) (Local Levels) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 28) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/242) be approved.
That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions and Requirements) (Local Levels) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 29) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/252) be approved.
That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions and Requirements) (Local Levels) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 30) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/255) be approved.
That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions and Requirements) (Local Levels) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 31) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/262) be approved.
That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions and Requirements) (Local Levels) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 32) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/263) be approved.
That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Requirements) (Scotland) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/277) be approved.—[John Swinney]
Motions agreed to.
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Scotland’s Strategic Framework
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
I appreciate that we are running slightly over time, but I hope to fit in two more short questions. I understand that, in the previous parliamentary session, the Scottish Government routinely provided the COVID-19 Committee with draft regulations for consideration before they were made law. Do you envisage that the committee will continue to be provided with draft health protection regulations on Wednesdays by 4 pm, ahead of our meetings on Thursday mornings?
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Scotland’s Strategic Framework
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
Thank you. That concludes our consideration of the first agenda item.
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Ministerial Updates on Coronavirus Legislation and Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 2 September 2021
Siobhian Brown
Thank you. Other members have questions.
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Interests
Meeting date: 23 June 2021
Siobhian Brown
Thank you, and good morning to the committee. As per my entry in the register of members’ interests, I am a councillor at South Ayrshire Council and, until I resigned on 7 May, I was a part-time caseworker for Allan Dorans, the member of Parliament for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock.
COVID-19 Recovery Committee
Work Programme
Meeting date: 23 June 2021
Siobhian Brown
I agree with that. I wonder whether that is where there might be a bit of a blur between the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee and us. However, I am sure that the clerks will point us in the right direction with regard to our remit.
No member has indicated that they wish to contribute further, so I thank you for all your comments. We all agree to hold a business planning session and to take evidence from the Deputy First Minister in due course. The clerks will take note of the suggestions for the business planning day and will provide further information and arrangements to members in due course.
That concludes the first meeting of the COVID-19 Recovery Committee.
Meeting closed at 09:33.