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 3539 contributions
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Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 10 January 2023
Kenneth Gibson
Good morning and welcome to the first meeting in 2023 of the Finance and Public Administration Committee. I wish you all a happy new year.
We have a single item on our agenda, which involves taking evidence from two panels of witnesses on the 2023-24 Scottish budget. First, we will hear from the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body on its own budget bid; we will then take evidence from the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Covid Recovery.
For the first panel of witnesses, Jackson Carlaw MSP, who is a member of the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body, is joined by Scottish Parliament officials. David McGill is clerk and chief executive of the Scottish Parliament; Michelle Hegarty is deputy chief executive; and Sara Glass is group head of financial governance. I welcome all of you to the meeting.
I understand that Mr Carlaw would like to make a short opening statement.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 10 January 2023
Kenneth Gibson
In other words, it is “steady as she goes”.
A total of £2.213 million is being spent on software and licences. What is the split between software support and licences?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 10 January 2023
Kenneth Gibson
I was hoping to find out how the costs for software and licences could be split up. It is like the question about the difference between contractors and permanent staff—I would like to see more directly where the money is going.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 10 January 2023
Kenneth Gibson
That would be great.
I have a question about another area—one that I do not think my colleagues will be queueing up to ask. It is about the issue of MSPs’ salaries. You mention an increase of 1.5 per cent. I will come back to that. The figure goes from £13.482 million to £13.499 million. I could not understand that, because a 1.5 per cent increase would have been £190,000, but the increase is only £17,000. Are there a couple of folk we do not know about who are going on extended unpaid leave? I am wondering how we got to those figures.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 10 January 2023
Kenneth Gibson
Indeed.
Okay, I have taken up more than enough time. I have more questions, but it is time to let other members in. Liz Smith will be first, followed by Daniel Johnson.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 10 January 2023
Kenneth Gibson
Thanks for confirming that we will get an updated financial memorandum—that is very good news.
I have a second question about that. You talked about £100 million extra going into national care service pay, which will be very welcome. For every £1 increase in hourly pay for care staff, what is the impact on the Scottish budget? For example, if the pay was to go up from £10.90 to £11.90, what would be the additional impact on the Scottish budget? That is significant, and I imagine that the issue is likely to come up over the next few weeks.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 10 January 2023
Kenneth Gibson
No. It is just about the impact on the Scottish budget of every additional £1 in hourly pay.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 20 December 2022
Kenneth Gibson
Good morning, and welcome to the 34th meeting in 2022 of the Finance and Public Administration Committee. We have received apologies from Douglas Lumsden, who is attending a funeral today.
The first item on our agenda is an evidence session with the Scottish Government’s expert panel on the Scottish budget for 2023-24. We are joined remotely by Professor Sir Anton Muscatelli, principal and vice-chancellor of the University of Glasgow; Professor Frances Ruane, chair of the national competitiveness and productivity council and research affiliate at the Economic and Social Research Institute; and Dr Mike Brewer, chief economist and deputy chief executive at the Resolution Foundation. I welcome you all to the meeting.
I intend to allow up to 75 minutes for the session. We will move straight to questions. Our questions do not have to be answered by everybody. I will put my questions to Professor Muscatelli, who can decide which of his colleagues should answer. Although more than one person can answer, that does not need to happen.
The “Expert Panel Interim Commentary on the Implications of the UK Government Fiscal Statements for the Scottish Government Budget” sets out the panel’s thinking
“on how the Scottish Government could respond to the challenges it is facing through the tax system and the wider implications for public services and the economy.”
It suggests that the Scottish Government will need to find a balance between
“providing short-term support to vulnerable households and businesses; and ... investing to grow and improve the productivity and resilience of the economy in the medium to longer term.”
Has it done so?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 20 December 2022
Kenneth Gibson
You have said that the UK Government’s decision not to enhance capital funding given the high levels of inflation
“will lead to a steep decline in the purchasing power of Scottish Government investments ... this may hamper the Scottish Government’s ability to meet its net zero targets and damage the economic recovery”.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2023-24
Meeting date: 20 December 2022
Kenneth Gibson
You said:
“it is important to achieve the right type of growth: growth that is sustainable and in line with other wider policy objectives, such as reducing inequality and the transition to net zero”.
Clearly, you will not be recommending the building of a giant coal mine, which they are suggesting will go ahead in Cumbria. Will you give us some examples of sustainable growth that is of the right type to reduce inequality and support the transition to net zero?
