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 1041 contributions
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Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
Yes. Peter, when was the constitution published?
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
The constitution is referenced in the regulations. Today, we are agreeing the regulations in which the constitution is rooted. The legislation and regulations are a matter for the Parliament. It is now for the PNBS to agree its own day-to-day operations. I will just check with officials that I have articulated that correctly.
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
So some of this is just about practicalities.
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
On the specific point about deadlock, I think that I have spoken effectively to the principal point and the importance of arbitration and acting in good faith. We would accept any arbitration decision, other than in very exceptional circumstances, as you would expect any Government to articulate.
I also addressed the issue that the regulations are for the Parliament and the constitution is rooted in the regulations. The constitution has been consulted on and negotiated, and we have come to a consensus agreement on it.
I will ask officials to talk about the guide, how it will be developed and the type of issues that it will address.
I think that your other point was a worry about the arbitration process being stifled and blockers being put on it.
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
The whole purpose of arbitration is to avoid deadlock, and the whole purpose of having an independent chair is to bring the sides together if there is an inability to agree. Normally, it would be for both sides to agree that a matter needs to go to arbitration. If the independent chair thinks that one side or the other is blocking procedures, they have the power to kick off the arbitration process.
I will hand over to officials to give Mr Greene more detail.
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
The purpose of a PNB is to enable that negotiation to take place. I am not talking about specific pay claims or, indeed, specific circumstances, because any processes that exist must be respected and must have integrity. However, this is about ensuring that, for negotiating partners, whether they be doing annual pay deals or seeking something longer term—indeed, some parts of the public sector have negotiated multiyear or two-year pay deals—we continue to have in place arrangements that are solid and fair, particularly to police officers, who cannot withdraw their labour.
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
It is part of the package. The constitution is referenced in the regulations and the policy note. The date that I have for it is May 2023.
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
It is not news to the Government. It is a matter for the Parliament, in terms of law and regulation. The lawyer here will keep me right, but it would not be a matter for the PNBS to change its constitution.
Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
With respect, I am happy to go over the issues in more detail, but it is for the Parliament to pass regulations. It would not be the norm if the PNBS were changing its own constitution. It could, of course, come back to ministers at some point, in the fullness time, if there were something inoperable about the constitution that could be changed. However, I am conscious that time and effort have been invested to come to an agreement on the constitution and, bearing in mind the 2016 act, MSPs would be well within their rights to be somewhat concerned if matters of the constitution of this very important body were not dealt with by the Parliament via regulations but were dealt with in a more ad hoc way.
10:30Criminal Justice Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 June 2023
Angela Constance
First, let me say that I have no objection to answering any questions from committee members.
I will respond to the convener in a way that I hope will be helpful and clear. I will do my best to be succinct. The process that we are all now following was set out in the 2016 act. In terms of the constitution, the information was made available with the papers on the instrument, although people may or may not choose to read or print links or whatever.
I do not think that there are many more ways in which I can commit to the value and importance that the Government sees in arbitration and, as always, in working in good faith and as a good actor.
There are some matters in the correspondence from the Scottish Police Federation that could be addressed through the guide that will be agreed by all the PNBS members. With the greatest of respect to the SPF, my understanding was that it was broadly content, and I am conscious that other partners and staff associations were also involved in the process and that they have not made any representations to the committee, to the best of my knowledge. Therefore, we have a situation in which people are happy to move forward. As with any set of arrangements, people—whether it is the Scottish Police Federation or any other party—have the right to bore down into the detail, but in my view that will now be a matter for the guide that all partners will work collaboratively to develop.
I think that it is time that we moved on to have a Police Negotiating Board for Scotland, as opposed to using the legacy arrangement of a UK body. It is my view, and that of the Government, that a police negotiating board scenario, with the protection of arbitration built in, is far preferable to a police pay review body, which is what exists down south. That is not a negotiating body. It can make recommendations to the Home Secretary, because it is accountable to the Home Secretary but, of course, there is a pattern of recommendations not being accepted.
I think that I have put on the record in the strongest possible terms that we want to, and will continue to, enter into all this in good faith and will accept the principles and purpose of arbitration.
