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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Displaying 1142 contributions
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Meeting of the Parliament [Last updated 19:54]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 22 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
The international development fund will increase by 25 per cent compared with last year. At the same time, the alcohol and drugs budget is being cut by around £1.3 million in real terms, and the health capital budget is being cut by almost £50 million. Our constituents will be wondering why those issues were not as high up the priority list as international development.
Will the Scottish Government simply get on with the priorities of hard-working Scots: building hospitals, improving public services and addressing Scotland’s shameful drug deaths crisis, which remains the worst in Europe?
Meeting of the Parliament [Last updated 19:54]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 22 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
To ask the Scottish Government how the increase in the international development fund that was announced in the draft 2026-27 Scottish budget will be spent. (S6O-05407)
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 22 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
The international development fund will increase by 25 per cent compared with last year. At the same time, the alcohol and drugs budget is being cut by around £1.3 million in real terms, and the health capital budget is being cut by almost £50 million. Our constituents will be wondering why those issues were not as high up the priority list as international development.
Will the Scottish Government simply get on with the priorities of hard-working Scots: building hospitals, improving public services and addressing Scotland’s shameful drug deaths crisis, which remains the worst in Europe?
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 22 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
To ask the Scottish Government how the increase in the international development fund that was announced in the draft 2026-27 Scottish budget will be spent. (S6O-05407)
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Tertiary Education and Training (Funding and Governance) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 3
Meeting date: 20 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
On a point of order, Presiding Officer. My app would not connect. I would have voted yes.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Tertiary Education and Training (Funding and Governance) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 3
Meeting date: 20 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Once again, my app would not connect. I would have voted yes.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee [Draft]
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
I am very grateful, convener. I just want to convey my thanks to the committee for its work on this particular petition. I know from working with the families, and certainly from being part of the debates on the issue, how sensitive it is. However, that being said, there are still some real concerns that have not been addressed by the minister or by the Scottish Government. Some of those concerns have already been touched on, but I stress the concern about the number of beds, because that is a really important point and I have been trying to pursue it with the minister. At present, in neonatal wards, there is, for every 10 babies born, only one bed for parents to stay over. If the centralisation or downgrading—however you want to term it—takes place, there is a risk that parents will not be able to stay close by their babies, who are very vulnerable and very sick. That is not the right care or the way in which we should be treating families who are in that difficult position. I ask the committee, please, to continue with the petition—for the sake of the families and of any families who need to use these vital services in the future.
11:15
The report also said that there could be between three and five specialised units. It is for the Scottish Government to explain why there are three, not five. If there were five, it would give families more reassurance about where they could go, should their babies need that specialised care.
I appreciate having the time for a short contribution.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee [Draft]
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
I am very grateful, convener. I just want to convey my thanks to the committee for its work on this particular petition. I know from working with the families, and certainly from being part of the debates on the issue, how sensitive it is. However, that being said, there are still some real concerns that have not been addressed by the minister or by the Scottish Government. Some of those concerns have already been touched on, but I stress the concern about the number of beds, because that is a really important point and I have been trying to pursue it with the minister. At present, in neonatal wards, there is, for every 10 babies born, only one bed for parents to stay over. If the centralisation or downgrading—however you want to term it—takes place, there is a risk that parents will not be able to stay close by their babies, who are very vulnerable and very sick. That is not the right care or the way in which we should be treating families who are in that difficult position. I ask the committee, please, to continue with the petition—for the sake of the families and of any families who need to use these vital services in the future.
11:15
The report also said that there could be between three and five specialised units. It is for the Scottish Government to explain why there are three, not five. If there were five, it would give families more reassurance about where they could go, should their babies need that specialised care.
I appreciate having the time for a short contribution.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Draft Climate Change Plan
Meeting date: 13 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
Very quickly, I will note that I was pleased to hear what you said about the private rented sector. When the initial proposals came out, the sector felt that it was being unfairly treated, as it would have been required to have everything in place, particularly for new tenancies, before other parts of the housing sector.
Are you having an on-going conversation with the private rented sector to inform any future pieces of legislation? The feedback that I have had is that the sector does not want to have to meet a lot of up-front costs for putting the new policies in place before other parts of the housing sector. It is really all about fairness.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Draft Climate Change Plan
Meeting date: 13 January 2026
Meghan Gallacher
Good morning. I will go back to your discussion with Willie Coffey on heat pumps to ask about something that I hope can be expanded on.
When we started talking about heat in buildings back in 2023, there was a huge emphasis on heat pumps, even though there are, in fact, other clean energies that can be used to heat homes efficiently and effectively. Has there been any change in direction from the Government? Businesses and stakeholders tell me that they want to help and be part of this story. Are you now having those kinds of conversations to inform any legislation that might come forward?
