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 1243 contributions
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Meeting of the Parliament [Last updated 11:33]
Protecting Children from Harm
Meeting date: 25 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
::The Scottish Conservatives have been calling for an inquiry for months, but there has been no urgency from the Government—none whatsoever. It was confirmed in November 2025 that we did not know the true scale and nature of grooming gangs. I even asked a question on it, and it has taken the Government four months to come to the chamber today to announce an inquiry. What concerns me more is that the cabinet secretary seems unable to tell Parliament what further information has come to light for the Government to change its mind.
The inquiry needs to be fearless and fully transparent and, most important, it needs to have victims at its heart. The Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee considered a petition that called for a national whistleblowing officer to be established. Will the Scottish Government now consider that, to give whistleblowers the confidence to come forward and stand up for victims, so that victims get the justice that they deserve?
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Protecting Children from Harm
Meeting date: 25 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
The Scottish Conservatives have been calling for an inquiry for months, but there has been no urgency from the Government—none whatsoever. It was confirmed in November 2025 that we did not know the true scale and nature of grooming gangs. I even asked a question on it, and it has taken the Government four months to come to the chamber today to announce an inquiry. What concerns me more is that the cabinet secretary seems unable to tell Parliament what further information has come to light for the Government to change its mind.
The inquiry needs to be fearless and fully transparent and, most important, it needs to have victims at its heart. The Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee considered a petition that called for a national whistleblowing officer to be established. Will the Scottish Government now consider that, to give whistleblowers the confidence to come forward and stand up for victims, so that victims get the justice that they deserve?
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 24 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
Good morning. We have already touched on the premiums, so I will not go back to questions on those. However, the committee heard last week about a number of circumstances that may arise in rural areas where properties might need to be left empty for periods of time. One example that was given was operational rural accommodation linked to estate operations. I am looking for more information from the cabinet secretary on whether the Scottish Government will provide guidance for local authorities to help to ensure consistency in how those properties are treated.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 24 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
:I am still a little bit concerned, because I believe that there is a risk that local authorities are, in effect, incentivised to not exempt such properties because of the additional income that they might get from generating those types of policies. How does the cabinet secretary propose to mitigate that?
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 24 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
:That is helpful. Thank you.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 24 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
:Good morning. Cabinet secretary, you touched on the fact that the exemption will apply to buildings of more than six units. How did the Scottish Government take account of the differences between urban and rural settings when arriving at that definition?
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 24 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
:That is helpful to know.
Cabinet secretary, you mentioned earlier that you hope to incentivise turning short-term lets into longer-term tenancies. However, measures being brought in by this Scottish Government, particularly during this parliamentary session, will not incentivise people to enter the private rented sector in order to bring those homes in and create longer-term rental properties. What is the Government’s overall strategy? If the Government continues to disincentivise the private rented sector, the proposed measure will not achieve the desired outcome.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 24 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
:Thank you.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
First Minister’s Question Time
Meeting date: 19 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
The First Minister will be aware of the report on the unannounced inspection of Skye house in August 2025. I share the Government’s concerns about the report’s findings regarding culture, staff resourcing and the use of restraints and other cruel practices. However, the report does not address the journeys of young people and how they entered Skye house in the first place. I am concerned that, when parents and carers raise concerns about culture in our national health service and social work departments, they are being met with a defensive response and an attempt to shut down such concerns without any accountability or willingness to improve services.
Will the First Minister now instruct a review of child and adolescent mental health services, NHS boards and social work services to discover how many concerns have been raised in respect of culture, to prevent young people from being failed and, ultimately, put in institutions that risk causing more harm than good?
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
First Minister’s Question Time
Meeting date: 19 February 2026
Meghan Gallacher
The First Minister will be aware of the report on the unannounced inspection of Skye house in August 2025. I share the Government’s concerns about the report’s findings regarding culture, staff resourcing and the use of restraints and other cruel practices. However, the report does not address the journeys of young people and how they entered Skye house in the first place. I am concerned that, when parents and carers raise concerns about culture in our national health service and social work departments, they are being met with a defensive response and an attempt to shut down such concerns without any accountability or willingness to improve services.
Will the First Minister now instruct a review of child and adolescent mental health services, NHS boards and social work services to discover how many concerns have been raised in respect of culture, to prevent young people from being failed and, ultimately, put in institutions that risk causing more harm than good?
