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 1696 contributions
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Economy and Fair Work Committee
Bankruptcy and Diligence (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
Thank you. Murdo Fraser mentioned minimal asset process bankruptcy and the reduction in the time limit for that as another policy area we may want to explore. Another area that has been raised with the committee is bank arrestments. The protected balance for bank arrestments went up to £1,000. It is proposed that the protected balance for wage arrestments should also go up to £1,000. Does Edinburgh want to comment on the impact that the changes to the bank arrestment made and whether, if there is a case that wage arrestments should be increased to £1,000 you would support that?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Bankruptcy and Diligence (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
I do not know whether the sheriff officers have a view on that. I understand that around £550 is protected for wages arrestment. For banks, it is £1,000.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Skills Delivery Landscape
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
Kevin Stewart, would you like to ask a question?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Skills Delivery Landscape
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
When you talked about hairdressing, engineering and forestry earlier, it struck me that those roles are traditionally gendered ones. We know from the discussion about the modern apprenticeships system that it is very male dominated.
You have talked about the need for structural reform. Do you see the structural reform that you have suggested in any way addressing inequalities in the system? How can we address occupational segregation issues, particularly in relation to gender, although we can apply the same approach to disability? You will know that the committee has done a short piece of work on the disability employment gap. Do you see inequalities? How will we address inequalities through the reforms that you have suggested?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Skills Delivery Landscape
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
Okay. Thank you very much. That brings us to the end of the evidence session. I thank James Withers for his attendance at the meeting. We will now move into private session.
11:21 Meeting continued in private until 11:47.Economy and Fair Work Committee
Skills Delivery Landscape
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
Our next item of business is an evidence session on the independent review of the skills delivery landscape report by James Withers. I welcome James Withers to the committee. I would be grateful if members and the witness could be as concise as possible with questions and answers.
The report was published in June. How do you feel about the Government’s response to the report and will you update us on whether there were any discussions with the Government over the summer about implementation?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Bankruptcy and Diligence (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
I will come to our other witnesses. Do you have any views on what the proposal would result in? Would it lead to additional costs? Do you have any concerns about the proposal?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Decision on Taking Business in Private
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
Good morning and welcome to the 24th meeting in 2023 of the Economy and Fair Work Committee. Our first item of business this morning is to decide whether to take items 5, 6 and 8 in private. Are members content to takes those items in private?
Members indicated agreement.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Bankruptcy and Diligence (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
We now move to our next item of business. This is our third evidence session on the Bankruptcy and Diligence (Scotland) Bill. Today, we will hear from creditors. I welcome Andrew Fraser, president, and Roderick Macpherson, honorary secretary, at the Society of Messengers-at-Arms and Sheriff Officers; and Cheryl Hynd, council revenues manager, and Elizabeth McCrossan, senior transactions officer, at the City of Edinburgh Council. Questions will be directed to your organisations, so it would be helpful if you could decide among yourselves who will answer.
I will start. One of the proposals in the bill is to require banks and others who are subject to an arrestment request to provide information about why arrestment has been unsuccessful. We have heard some evidence from banks that that would be too onerous a duty to place on them. If there was a requirement for banks to share such information, would that be helpful? I put that to the City of Edinburgh Council first.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Bankruptcy and Diligence (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 27 September 2023
Claire Baker
That is helpful. As a supplementary question to that, is going through a collection agency a successful process? If you are dealing with people who have resources in the bank, is it a useful tool?
