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 1576 contributions
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Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Portfolio Question Time
Meeting date: 12 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
I mentioned the heat in buildings bill, which we have committed to introduce in year 5 of this session of Parliament.
With regard to the points that were made about earlier legislation, it is worth saying that we are now exploring introducing an opt-in rights and powers licence via the heat in buildings bill, which would be akin to the installation and maintenance licence that is being introduced in the rest of GB. That is because many of the provisions of part 1 of the legislation, such as those to do with financial wellbeing, will be covered by Great Britain-wide authorisation. More detail will follow when the heat in buildings bill is introduced, but I assure Lorna Slater that that will happen in this parliamentary year.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Portfolio Question Time
Meeting date: 12 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
I am not sure that I would characterise the future situation as one in which we will have a huge excess of electricity, given the electrification of the country that is taking place. However, I understand Sarah Boyack’s point about the need to ensure that different local authorities work together. We are seeking to support such work in the part of the world that she represents, and we will do that elsewhere in the country.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Care Reform (Scotland) Bill: Stage 3
Meeting date: 10 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
On a point of order, Deputy Presiding Officer. I attempted to vote no. I am seeking to find out whether it registered.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 5 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
We welcome the report from the Just Transition Commission. As I set out in my statement on Tuesday, we accept the headline recommendations in principle. Before doing further planning, we first need clarity on the United Kingdom Government’s intentions in a range of key reserved areas, including the future regulatory and fiscal regimes for North Sea oil and gas and support for the Acorn carbon capture and storage project.
Aside from planning, the Scottish Government is taking action. We will continue to provide support to the region, including through the new £8.5 million round of the just transition fund for the north-east and Moray.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 5 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
As I mentioned, there is on-going support from the Scottish Government in a number of those areas. The Scottish Government is committed to developing heat networks as a key part of the way in which we will decarbonise our country in the future.
As I mentioned, we have funded Zero Waste Scotland to provide capacity building in support of local authorities. It is also worth pointing out that, in Edinburgh—which will be of interest to the member—the council has recently utilised its funding to further refine the zones that are identified in its LHEES and to seek legal counsel on the most appropriate delivery model to bring heat networks to market.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 5 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
Communities are important, and I attempted to touch on that issue in my statement. On the member’s point about community benefit, I think that she might be talking about onshore developments. The Scottish Government is in touch with the UK Government—because the issue of mandating community benefits is reserved—about ensuring that communities are the mandatory recipients of benefits in the future.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 5 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
We are committed to supporting local authorities to deliver their LHEES and are continuously seeking their input on the process of doing so. The Scottish Government is providing £2.4 million per annum to local authorities to use at their discretion to support LHEES development and implementation. Zero Waste Scotland is also delivering capacity building to local authorities that is focused on LHEES implementation. In addition, we have committed more than £815,000 of grant funding to local authorities through our heat network support unit to take forward heat network opportunities.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
General Question Time
Meeting date: 5 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
The member is right to point out that some of these issues cross local authority boundaries. We work with local authorities to ensure that co-operation is there. We know that there is a particular enthusiasm around heat network development. We have information on grant funding that is allocated via the heat network support unit equating to more than £815,000, to support the development of city-wide, town-wide or cross-local-authority heat networks.
I encourage the member to contact the Scottish Government if he requires anything related to his local area. Co-operation is being promoted by the Scottish Government.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Just Transition (Aberdeen and North-east Scotland)
Meeting date: 3 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
The member rightly pointed to the RGU report, which I am sure the UK and Scottish Governments will draw many important lessons from.
Sarah Boyack will be aware of the investment that the Scottish Government has made, working with the UK Government, in initiatives such as the offshore skills passport and in many other wider projects that are within our responsibility—not least the wider investment in Aberdeen and the Aberdeen area through the £125 million that has been allocated for its economic development. I accept what the member says about the importance of the RGU report. We will learn from it, and we hope that the UK Government will, too.
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Just Transition (Aberdeen and North-east Scotland)
Meeting date: 3 June 2025
Alasdair Allan
Publicly and privately, the Scottish Government has made plain to the UK Government its position that the levy must have an end date and that we have concerns about the increase in the levy and the impact that it clearly has, as the member is only too aware, on investment decisions that are made in the sector in the north-east of Scotland. We will continue to make that position clear publicly and in our engagements with the UK Government.
