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.
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
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.
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.
There are two types of keyword search:
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.
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
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:
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.
Displaying 1388 contributions
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 23 May 2023
Tess White
You are still not really answering the question about how to strike a balance between inclusion, fairness and safety, but I will leave it there.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 23 May 2023
Tess White
On the theme of consultants, Gordon Jamieson said in his submission that the board has a number of consultant roles that can take years to fill, so they are covered by agency staff. That has a huge cost. How many years would you say it is taking to recruit consultants, and do you have a view on the cost implications of that?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 23 May 2023
Tess White
I have two questions on consultants and a supplementary. My first question is for Michael Dickson.
At the end of last year, NHS Shetland had a vacancy rate of 39 per cent for medical and dental consultants, which is against a backdrop of 6.5 per cent for the whole of Scotland. In your submission, you stated that it is
“difficult to recruit consultants with the breadth of skills needed”
for a remote and rural location
“because the NHS no longer trains staff in that way.”
Can you say a bit more about that and can you give your view on how to overcome it?
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 17 May 2023
Tess White
Poor mental health is a serious public health challenge. Most of all, it can be very frightening and isolating for those who experience it.
The reality is that Scottish mental health services simply are not meeting existing levels of demand. Thousands of children and adults are on waiting lists, and thousands more are being rejected for mental health treatment after their initial referral. Furthermore, on the SNP’s watch, 1.5 million working days have been lost in the NHS due to mental illness since 2018.
There is a mental health crisis in Scotland. After 16 years at the helm, the SNP Government—along with its Green partners—must take full responsibility for the mismanagement of our mental health services.
Over the past year, I have been supporting a constituent in the north-east and her family whose horrendous story brings into sharp relief why the system must change.
After receiving successful treatment in a central belt mother and baby unit for postpartum psychosis, my constituent was sectioned in the Carseview centre in Tayside, where mental health services were so poor that they were subject to an independent inquiry by Dr David Strang.
The transition from perinatal mental health services to general adult services was abrupt and distressing. My constituent was separated from her children and her support system. She was very, very scared. She described the experience as being
“like living a nightmare; the whole experience just didn’t seem real.”
My constituent’s sister has been advocating on her behalf and has lodged a petition with the Scottish Parliament to improve maternal mental health services.
The Scottish Government must do better for women as they navigate motherhood. It is shocking that the mental health strategy mentions “women” only four times—and one of those is in a footnote. The strategy is gender blind, even though women are twice as likely to be diagnosed with anxiety as men.
The Scottish Conservatives believe that we need modern, efficient and local solutions for mental health care. For communities across Scotland and in the north-east, we want to see local delivery. I have raised the closure of the Mulberry unit for acute mental health care at Stracathro hospital numerous times with the Scottish Government. The unit closed because of insufficient staffing, which is a problem that we keep seeing in healthcare delivery in the north-east. Distressed and vulnerable patients in Angus now must travel many miles for mental health treatment. How can that be right?
I urge the Scottish Government to stop the platitudes and recycled policy pledges. It must get a grip on a crisis that is affecting thousands of people now and that will haunt thousands in the future if they do not get the care and treatment that they need.
16:34Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Tess White
[Inaudible.]—health boards to manage women with mesh complications?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Tess White
I appreciate the acceptance that an 82-week wait is not acceptable, but what guidance is being given to health boards to manage women with mesh complications?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Tess White
I am reminded of the woman who had to wait a year and a half for an urgent referral, so here is just a thought. Sometimes, GPs are unable to help women who require mesh removal. Would it be better for GPs to be able to refer directly to the CMSS, or is there another way to get through the seeming bottleneck?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Tess White
I have two questions for you, minister. We have heard that one mesh-injured woman who has debilitating pain has been waiting for 82 weeks for an urgent referral. What guidance is being given to health boards to manage women who have mesh-related complications?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Tess White
That was my first question. Secondly, at the committee meeting on 2 May, there was significant confusion about the referral pathway, so I would like to clear up that issue today. What work is being done to ensure that health boards follow the same referral pathways when mesh is identified as a factor?
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Tess White
Thank you.
09:45