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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Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
The result of the division is: For 1, Against 6, Abstentions 0.
Amendment 546 disagreed to.
Amendment 547 moved—[Maggie Chapman].
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
There will be a division.
For
Burgess, Ariane (Highlands and Islands) (Green)
Against
Coffey, Willie (Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley) (SNP)
Gallacher, Meghan (Central Scotland) (Con)
Griffin, Mark (Central Scotland) (Lab)
MacGregor, Fulton (Coatbridge and Chryston) (SNP)
Stevenson, Collette (East Kilbride) (SNP)
Stewart, Alexander (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con)
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
I call myself to speak to amendment 504, in my name, and other amendments in the group. As we have heard from Mark Griffin and Emma Roddick, many committee members will have been asked to help constituents who are experiencing difficulties with property factors. Some property factors provide good services to owners, but many do not.
Since the Property Factors (Scotland) Act 2011 came into force, the number of complaints has grown, starting at 26 and reaching a record high of 338 in 2023. Many owners of factored properties complain that much-needed repairs are not done or that they are delayed, carried out to a poor standard or overcharged for. This really matters to a great many people. Approximately 710,000 Scottish properties—about a quarter of all homes—are managed by almost 400 property factors and letting companies. When owners want to change factors, it can be very difficult to do so, given the high threshold for agreement that is needed. In larger developments that perhaps have many absentee owners, it can be practically impossible, which means that factors lack the incentive to improve and owners are stuck with a poor service.
We do not tolerate that in other markets. If your bank provides a poor service, you can move your account—and the United Kingdom Government has changed the law to make it easier to do that. It used to be much harder to switch energy providers, but energy customers can now switch more easily if they are paying too much or are getting a poor service.
We could do the same with property factors. At the moment, it is very complicated to dismiss or to appoint a factor, and different thresholds for reaching a decision apply to different developments. Amendment 505 would address that by requiring only a majority vote. Previous legislation has already lowered the threshold, so my amendment is not at all unprecedented or experimental.
Amendment 504 would provide for a simple process for requesting that a factor be removed from the register. Owners would be able to send a request to the Scottish Government on the basis that their factor is falling short of its obligations, and ministers would be under a duty to consider the request and to either remove or retain the factor, giving reasons for the decision. Information on the number of factors removed or retained and the reasons for that would have to be published. That would improve transparency and strengthen the hand of owners against poor factors.
Advice Direct Scotland supports changes to the factoring system. It has stated:
“The kind of reforms and legislation within the Act of 2011 don’t really hold factors to account as much as they probably should. There’s an urgent need for greater transparency and awareness to ensure homeowners understand their rights and can effectively challenge unfair factoring practices.”
As Mark Griffin mentioned, former MSP Patricia Ferguson, who introduced the bill that became the 2011 act, is supportive of a reset of the relationship between owners and factors. We can discuss the details over the summer and I am happy to make changes to my amendments ahead of stage 3, but it is beyond doubt that the property factoring industry needs to change. Although I appreciate that the Scottish Government might intend to review the situation shortly, it might take years for a review to be established, conducted and reported on and for that to result in changes. Some owners simply cannot wait that long.
I call Mark Griffin to wind up and to press or withdraw amendment 507.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
There will be a division.
For
Burgess, Ariane (Highlands and Islands) (Green)
Coffey, Willie (Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley) (SNP)
MacGregor, Fulton (Coatbridge and Chryston) (SNP)
Stevenson, Collette (East Kilbride) (SNP)
Against
Gallacher, Meghan (Central Scotland) (Con)
Griffin, Mark (Central Scotland) (Lab)
Stewart, Alexander (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con)
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
The question is, that amendment 223 be agreed to. Are we agreed?
Members: No.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
The question is, that amendment 568 be agreed to. Are we agreed?
Members: No.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
There will be a division.
For
Burgess, Ariane (Highlands and Islands) (Green)
Gallacher, Meghan (Central Scotland) (Con)
Griffin, Mark (Central Scotland) (Lab)
Stewart, Alexander (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con)
Against
Coffey, Willie (Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley) (SNP)
MacGregor, Fulton (Coatbridge and Chryston) (SNP)
Stevenson, Collette (East Kilbride) (SNP)
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
There will be a division.
For
Burgess, Ariane (Highlands and Islands) (Green)
Gallacher, Meghan (Central Scotland) (Con)
Griffin, Mark (Central Scotland) (Lab)
Stewart, Alexander (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con)
Against
Coffey, Willie (Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley) (SNP)
MacGregor, Fulton (Coatbridge and Chryston) (SNP)
Stevenson, Collette (East Kilbride) (SNP)
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
The question is, that amendment 462 be agreed to. Are we agreed?
Members: No.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Housing (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 29 May 2025
Ariane Burgess
The result of the division is: For 1, Against 6, Abstentions 0.
Amendment 462 disagreed to.
Amendment 463 moved—[Maggie Chapman].
