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 2021 contributions
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Education, Children and Young People Committee
Independent Review of the Skills Delivery Landscape
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
Good morning—I think that it still is morning. Thank you for answering our questions so far and for the work that you have put into your report. I will start with questions that are on the same theme that we have already discussed—leadership and reform—and then I will move on to funding. How will the Scottish Government taking responsibility for skills planning bring about the required culture change?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
Good morning, and thank you for the answers that you have given so far. The description that you have given us of education in your areas and the parts that you are responsible for sounds exciting—that is definitely the future that we should be gearing towards.
I want to pick up on a couple of the points that we have heard so far. Graham Hutton, in your opening remarks, you said that the status quo cannot continue, and Pauline Walker mentioned that it was having a significant impact on pupils from poorer backgrounds. Can you tell us what it is about the status quo that is causing the problem for people from poorer or disadvantaged backgrounds? What in the reforms would change that?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
I thank both of you for those comprehensive answers. Do you think that the current reforms will get us to where we need to be?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Independent Review of the Skills Delivery Landscape
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
It does—I appreciate that. In a similar vein, do you agree with Universities Scotland that some of the changes that you have suggested, including those that you have just described, can happen without legislative change? What decisions could be taken now around funding work-based learning or upskilling and reskilling, without legislative change?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
Thank you for your candour, particularly in your recent answers. There is no greater need than the need to do something about the inequality that Dr Shapira and others made points on. I will move on to that now. As I said to the cabinet secretary yesterday, one reason why I think that reform is so important is that the attainment gap so stubbornly remains.
I have another question before I go into detail on that, although this is related. Is there a risk that, without examination at SCQF level 5, there is more pressure on pupils at highers? Given what you said, Dr Shapira, how will that affect our poorest students?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
No problem. I probably waffled a little bit as well. The specific question is this: is there a risk that, without examination at SCQF level 5, there is more pressure on pupils at highers? What would the impact of that be on poorer students?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
Dr Shapira, do you want to come back in?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
Thank you. The interconnectedness of each part of the system and that lifelong linear learning that you described is crucial. Thank you for those answers.
I go back to the point about socioeconomic disadvantage. Dr Shapira, in your paper you note that the curriculum is narrowing and that that is socially stratified and has disproportionately affected students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Why is that? What would you change? How might that be affecting the attainment gap?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
When you say the “type of curriculum” that they are being exposed to, do you mean the subjects that they are being presented with and their assessment as opposed to looking at who is attaining what at the other side of it?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Pam Duncan-Glancy
I do, convener, if that is okay. Good morning. Thank you for the answers that you have given so far and for the information that you submitted in advance, which has been helpful.
Dr Shapira, I want to pick up your point about whole subjects being abandoned and, particularly, on the point that, contrary to the aspiration of curriculum for excellence, fewer subjects are now being studied. As you have said in your report, there has been a decline in social subjects like arts and modern languages. Why do you think that is the case? What do we need to do about it?
