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 1524 contributions
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Economy and Fair Work Committee
Scotland’s Economic Outlook
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Thank you all for joining us this morning. I would like to ask the same question of you all, but I will start with Emma Congreve. Is Brexit already baked into UK and Scottish economic performance or will it have a continuing and latent impact? If so, what do you think that will be?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Scotland’s Economic Outlook
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
I will stay with Professor Chadha to address investment. Each economic crisis can be different. After the financial crash, the Scottish Government embarked on a construction-led investment recovery. In 2010, it was estimated that around one third of all construction that was being done in the UK at that time was being done in Scotland. That was underpinned by building of the Queensferry crossing, by rail construction and so on.
Inflation and other aspects affect capital investment and the ability of businesses to invest. What is your take on where we are with business investment and the impact of the UK Chancellor of the Exchequer’s recent budget statement on business investment? Renewables are particularly important to the Scottish economy, as they are to the rest of the UK economy. What impact will the measures in the chancellor’s statement have on investment for recovery? Is that a route forward from the crisis or will progress be constrained by inflation?
I ask Professor Chadha to answer first then, if we have time, I would be interested to hear the perspective of the other witnesses.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Scotland’s Economic Outlook
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Finally, can Emma Congreve address business investment, particularly around renewables? A pipeline that has certainty encourages people to invest, but issues from the UK chancellor’s statement might impact on that. I am interested to know whether you think it will. It will clearly have implications for certainty for the Scottish Government and for where businesses can invest, in particular to deliver renewable energy and net zero.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Scotland’s Economic Outlook
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
I am conscious that it is a big question. I will come to Susan Murray. Feel free to do a top-line summary, if that is helpful.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Scotland’s Economic Outlook
Meeting date: 14 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Susan Murray, where do you see business investment going as a result of the UK chancellor’s statement? What would you expect from the Scottish budget that would help business and investment, and what is the potential impact of public investment on private business?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Just Transition
Meeting date: 7 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Minister, you referred to carbon capture and storage. The Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee, which I also sit on, produced a report on the Acorn project on carbon capture, utilisation and storage earlier this year and made it clear that it is a key energy transition requirement, but the project has been put on pause.
During the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee’s evidence session on the subject, Professor Haszeldine said that the project needed to be in operation by 2030 and that
“There is a five-year lead time for building such a project, so deciding now how we are going to handle that is fundamental to Scotland being able to meet or failing to meet its 2045 net zero target.”—[Official Report, Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee, 14 December 2021; c 14.]
Clearly, the Climate Change Committee has just brought out a very critical report, but that committee has said that that project is vital to the delivery of these very tough targets.
The Acorn project is located in the north-east of Scotland and we are here to focus on just transition, which is about the workforce and communities. Bearing that in mind, and the fact that this is a transition technology in a vital area for workforce skills, which would help with the shift from oil and gas to green hydrogen as a bridging technology, where do you think we are with that project and how critical do you think it is to delivering a just transition for Scotland?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Just Transition
Meeting date: 7 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
I also want to ask about the £500 million just transition fund for the north-east and Moray. Obviously, some projects have already been announced. I understand the importance of community co-operation and co-design, and of projects coming from communities. Every one of the 24 projects is worthy in and of itself, but it might be a fair criticism to say that they could be piecemeal if they are based on challenged funding.
There might be a need for a more strategic approach to such a significant element of funding. Some projects might come from private companies that could fund the projects themselves, so how are you balancing out the worthiness of each project? How are you making sure that, as opposed to supporting individual projects, there will be a strategic impact that will deliver a just transition? I understand that there is a tension there, so could you share your thinking about the funding mechanism and process?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Just Transition
Meeting date: 7 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
What is your relationship with the Just Transition Commission and how do you work with it? Can you provide evidence that you have already actioned some of the advice that the commission gave in its first report and in its latest report?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Just Transition
Meeting date: 7 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
This question might help our discussion. Graham Simpson asked about transport and I asked about energy. You are not the lead minister or cabinet secretary in those areas; you are our first ever just transition minister. It would be helpful if you could explain how you work with ministers in other policy areas and what levers you have to influence and push the agendas that we know will be critical to delivering a just transition in areas for which you might not have direct responsibility.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 6 December 2022
Fiona Hyslop
We move to questions. I have a few questions, then I will bring in Mark Ruskell and Liam Kerr.
Scottish Water gave evidence to the committee on its annual report. There might be costs involved in the implementation of the SSI. Will you explain those costs and how Scottish Water will manage them within its existing or proposed budget?
