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 1603 contributions
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Meeting of the Parliament
Topical Question Time
Meeting date: 14 November 2023
Katy Clark
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to a Unison survey that reportedly shows a 31 per cent increase in the number of violent incidents against public sector workers in the last year. (S6T-01631)
Meeting of the Parliament
Topical Question Time
Meeting date: 14 November 2023
Katy Clark
The cabinet secretary specifically referred to problems in schools. The research showed that, of the 35,000 verbal and physical attacks on council staff, the majority occurred in schools, and mostly against support staff. Will he outline more fully what support is being put into schools and what resources can be made available to address the problem?
Meeting of the Parliament
Ferguson Marine
Meeting date: 14 November 2023
Katy Clark
The people of Inverclyde and the people of Scotland want a competitive shipbuilding industry. International benchmarking agents have made recommendations, and cross-party and cross-sector representations have been made for infrastructure investment in the yard. There has already been a catalogue of mistakes by management and the Scottish Government relating to Ferguson Marine. Does the Scottish Government accept that there can be no further delay and that it cannot stand back and sabotage the shipyard by preventing it from competing competitively?
Meeting of the Parliament
Topical Question Time
Meeting date: 14 November 2023
Katy Clark
The Unison research shows that nearly 55,000 violent incidents against public sector staff were recorded last year, which is a 31 per cent increase from the previous year. However, many parts of the public sector, such as some of the big health boards, did not provide data. Does the cabinet secretary agree that all parts of the public sector need to co-operate so that we can get the best information in order to address these serious problems?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Kinship Care
Meeting date: 9 November 2023
Katy Clark
Will you give us an update on the recommendations of the English independent review of children’s social care and whether progress can be made towards the introduction of paid leave for new kinship carers?
09:30Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Scottish Employment Injuries Advisory Council Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 9 November 2023
Katy Clark
Yes—you have answered that question. Thank you.
I put the same question to Dr Simpson. How do you take into account the views of, and what is said by, those who have relevant lived experience?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Scottish Employment Injuries Advisory Council Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 9 November 2023
Katy Clark
My question is for Dr Rushton. It has been incredibly useful to hear about IIAC’s work and the skill sets of those who are involved. Could you give an indication of the time commitment that is required of your board members and of the secretariat? It sounds as though you are involved in a great deal of hands-on work—is it fair to say that?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Scottish Employment Injuries Advisory Council Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 9 November 2023
Katy Clark
Yes—I am sure that the way that the system works can be very frustrating.
In these situations, there are often different perspectives. I was previously a personal injury lawyer, so I am aware that the employer can have a very different perspective from that of the employee and their representatives. How do you deal with the fact that there are those different perspectives, and how is that represented in your work?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Scottish Employment Injuries Advisory Council Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 9 November 2023
Katy Clark
I will ask this question of both witnesses, but I will turn to Dr Rushton first. How do the bodies consider the views of those who have relevant lived experience? Is that part of your consideration? How do you capture that in the work that you do?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Kinship Care
Meeting date: 9 November 2023
Katy Clark
How will uplifts be calculated to take into account increases in the cost of living? Will increases be in line with inflation, or will another formula be used?
