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 3409 contributions
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Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Sue Webber
We know that whatever you say today might not be valid tomorrow, given the very fast pace of change, but, Dr Shapira, can you come in first, please?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Sue Webber
Thank you, professor. Marina, you indicated earlier that you wanted to come back in on this. Do you want to make a final comment?
Education, Children and Young People Committee
Education Reform
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Sue Webber
We will have questions on that specific theme from Mr Kidd.
Meeting of the Parliament
Education and Skills Reform
Meeting date: 7 November 2023
Sue Webber
In your statement, cabinet secretary, you talk about more committees and more working groups being set up, but I contend that everyone is now looking for action. You said that you will engage with Opposition spokespeople on next steps to allow for greater political consensus, yet we are starting that exact exercise at the Education, Children and Young People Committee tomorrow. I find it extraordinary that you have made that decision in a vacuum.
Meeting of the Parliament
Education and Skills Reform
Meeting date: 7 November 2023
Sue Webber
That circumvents the committee process, rather than waiting for the outcomes and the evidence that will be taken. What were you thinking, cabinet secretary?
Criminal Justice Committee, Health, Social Care and Sport Committee, and Social Justice and Social Security Committee (Joint Meeting)
Drug Deaths and Drug Harm
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Sue Webber
It is not a hidden fact that our party’s perspective on safer drug consumption facilities is different from that of others. We are very much looking forward to seeing the evidence before we take a position on consumption facilities being set up more widely across the country.
I am aware that the City of Edinburgh Council is considering such things, and I am also aware that the service in Glasgow is funded by the Scottish Government. Given that the integration joint board in Edinburgh is in critical financial strife, I would have grave concerns if any consumption facility were to be funded from its existing budget. I am therefore looking for a bit of assurance on that.
Recently, the minister and I have shared some correspondence on the priorities that I think that some of the IJBs and alcohol and drug partnerships need to have with regard to the medication assisted treatment standards. I would just highlight the case of a constituent from my area, who was on Buvidal in Edinburgh prison, and when he presented at the south-west office in Edinburgh, he was told that he could not have that and that he would have to come back in two weeks, which potentially meant that he would have to go back on to methadone. There is a mismatch here between harm reduction and the embedding of that approach and the investment that is needed at local level to really help our individuals. I do not want the cart to be put before the horse here; I want us to have services that help people to recover before we have services that prevent harm.
Criminal Justice Committee, Health, Social Care and Sport Committee, and Social Justice and Social Security Committee (Joint Meeting)
Drug Deaths and Drug Harm
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Sue Webber
I would hate to see a safer drug consumption facility being funded at the expense of other critical services in Edinburgh, because we cannot afford to cut any of those. That is my main point.
Criminal Justice Committee, Health, Social Care and Sport Committee, and Social Justice and Social Security Committee (Joint Meeting)
Drug Deaths and Drug Harm
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Sue Webber
I would be grateful for that.
Criminal Justice Committee, Health, Social Care and Sport Committee, and Social Justice and Social Security Committee (Joint Meeting)
Drug Deaths and Drug Harm
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Sue Webber
That is very helpful. That way, we can make sure that no other person falls through the system like that. Thank you very much.
Meeting of the Parliament
Edinburgh Tram Inquiry Report
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Sue Webber
Councillors rely on the accuracy of reports to enable them to take informed decisions, but on the Edinburgh tram project it is clear that councillors were misled by high-level officials at City of Edinburgh Council. In the inquiry’s report, Lord Hardie blasts Nick Smith of City of Edinburgh Council’s legal department for making inaccurate reports to councillors. Will the cabinet secretary lay out what action will be taken to hold to account those who are responsible? What reforms will be put in place to prevent that from happening again?
