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 1739 contributions
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Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
Well, is it ever enough? We could spend more in all these areas. Part of it is for the planning and delivery. In terms of the disruption, as the spend is being rolled out, there will be challenges in making sure that local authorities or transport authorities are running their systems. The fund is fairly ambitious in terms of spend for delivery, but, once it is delivered, the capital spend will allow passengers to experience the improvements. Therefore, it is incremental: every time you are building a new lane or whatever, it is then on to the next thing.
It is a big boost, and it has been welcomed by local authorities, regional transport partnerships and the bus industry. It is what they really want to help with the reliability that everybody is talking about.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
No, that is not correct. That is not what we said, and I will be answering a Government-initiated question later today that will help to clarify that.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
I am keen to use this year's financial provision to secure the purchase. It is complex. One aspect is negotiation: the heads of terms have been agreed, but the detail still has to be worked through. Some of that goes back to the 19th century; there has been no transfer of property for some time, so there is a lot to it. We want to have as clean a title as possible, so I ask members to bear with us. I know that there is a lot of interest in the matter, and I will inform Parliament at the earliest and most appropriate opportunity.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
That is being led by the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government, but we can tell you that the transfer power is now being consulted on, so I encourage everybody to get involved in that. The power will apply from 2027, but for the first year, the level will reflect the UK’s air passenger duty level. We will not, therefore, introduce something in the first year. We have an intention to introduce something in relation to private jet travel, but it would probably be best if that aspect was led by the Exchequer.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
In the first year, yes.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
I am not a lead on that; it is being led by the finance secretary.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
I might bring in Catherine Jess-Gibson on that question, but it is probably most appropriate for Gillian Martin to answer when she comes to committee next week to give evidence on the climate change plan.
It is for early-stage and new projects, so it will, in my understanding, be for projects at the start rather than continuing projects. It will be for new policies that are coming forward. I do not know whether Catherine Jess-Gibson has anything to add on that.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
Indeed.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Budget Scrutiny 2026-27
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
You make an important point about viability and whether £2 is enough to deliver what is required. In parts of the rest of the UK, for example, the cap is £3. I will be up front: it was part of negotiations on the budget, and the Government’s requirement was that we looked at a £2 bus fare cap. With regard to whether it works or not, it is potentially very marginal. Part of the lessons from the pilot will be whether £2 is either too low, or low enough that it creates increased patronage. Those are exactly the sort of things that we need to consider as part of the pilot.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Draft Climate Change Plan
Meeting date: 3 February 2026
Fiona Hyslop
You might like figures, but I do not have figures to hand to give you an illustrative amount for different types of families and their incomes.
One of the challenges that we have faced concerns the ability of people’s income levels to sustain the credit ratings that are required for purchasing a car using a loan. We need to address that, and there have to be different ways of purchasing an EV.
The previous UK Conservative Government and the current Labour Government set targets for reducing the purchases of new non-electric vehicles—I emphasise that that is what the schemes are set up to do. The new purchases will end, so there will be more of a premium in the second-hand market, which we are already starting to see.
You are correct to say that there is a question about what the sweet spot would be in terms of the affordability for families of a second-hand car. Of course, if the second-hand car market develops, it will give more confidence to those who are buying their first, new electric car, because they know that they will have a resale price on it.
If you speak to the car dealerships, they will be able to give you average prices currently. However, the cost of EVs is generally coming down, and many people who are on a payment plan will find that the price of new EVs is not too dissimilar to that of petrol or diesel cars. The issue is how we make the switch to an EV more possible to more people on lower incomes.
