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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Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Instruments subject to Made Affirmative Procedure
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Before our consideration of Scottish statutory instruments, I suggest to members that, as we are meeting online, you will find it more challenging to indicate agreement to the instruments under discussion. I therefore ask you to raise your hand if you are not content with the question being put or if you wish to talk about an instrument.
Agenda item 3 is consideration of made affirmative instruments, on which no points have been raised.
Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Instrument subject to Negative Procedure
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
An issue has been raised on this instrument, which amends the Prisons and Young Offenders Institutions (Scotland) Rules 2011. As it was laid before the Parliament on 30 November and came into force on 13 December 2021, it does not respect the requirement in section 28(2) of the Interpretation and Legislative Reform (Scotland) Act 2021 that at least 28 days should elapse between the laying of an instrument that is subject to the negative procedure and the coming into force of that instrument.
Before I invite comments from members on whether the breach of the 28-day rule was appropriate, does the committee agree to report the instrument on reporting ground (j) for failure to lay it in accordance with laying requirements under the Interpretation and Legislative Reform (Scotland) Act 2010?
No member has indicated that they are not content, so we are agreed.
As well as the explanation provided by the Scottish Government for the breach, members will have seen the correspondence from the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research. Although the letter probably focuses more on wider policy concerns instead of issues that fall within our technical remit, it also refers to the speed with which the changes have been implemented.
Do members have any comments?
Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Instrument subject to Negative Procedure
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Agenda item 5 is consideration of a negative instrument.
Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Made Affirmative Procedure Inquiry
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Yes, it does. My question is on the matter of urgency, which Jonathan Jones has touched on and which Dr Fox commented on last week. My question is for both witnesses. Do you have any recommendations on the definition of urgency or the mechanisms that should be put in place that Governments would have to follow before using the made affirmative procedure?
Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Made Affirmative Procedure Inquiry
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Professor Tierney touched on September 11. As I prepared for today, I was struck by the events of 9/11 and by the situation when mad cow disease came into the UK. Are you aware of measures that were brought in at that time regarding the made affirmative procedure? Was any other scrutiny brought in with that? Those two huge events have had an impact on life ever since.
Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Made Affirmative Procedure Inquiry
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Okay—no problem.
Sir Jonathan, you spoke a moment ago about some things that could happen to try to provide more scrutiny. Graham Simpson gave the example of the Covid passport instrument. I am not sure whether you are aware of this but, prior to the final instrument coming to the Parliament, a statement was given in the chamber, and there were questions to the relevant minister. The Minister for Parliamentary Business also came before our committee and took questions from us.
There was some pre-scrutiny in that instance. I accept that there was not so much scrutiny of the instrument itself, but there were opportunities for dialogue and scrutiny with the relevant ministers. Clearly, colleagues might not have been happy with some of the responses from the minister, but that happens in every Parliament. However, that approach has not been taken with every made affirmative instrument that has come to the Parliament. I cannot comment about what happens elsewhere. I wanted to make you aware of the actions that took place, because that instrument clearly had a lot more public and political interest to it than many of the other made affirmatives that have come into the committee and the Parliament.
I have a question for both Professor Tierney and Sir Jonathan on the issue of legislation and the legal requirement to provide evidence of urgency. From what you have both said, it is clear that more information should be presented. Should that requirement be put on a legal footing? If that is the case, do you have any examples of existing legislation that could help with the situation that we currently face? Clearly, Covid is not going away any time soon and we will be living with it for some time, whether in an emergency situation, as at present, or further down the line when society has returned to a more normal state.
11:00Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Made Affirmative Procedure Inquiry
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
I thank Professor Tierney and Sir Jonathan Jones for their helpful evidence. The committee might wish to follow up by letter any additional questions stemming from the meeting—we will discuss that later on this morning. Thank you very much to you both, gentlemen.
I briefly suspend the meeting to let the witnesses leave BlueJeans.
11:38 Meeting suspended.11:43 On resuming—
Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Instruments not subject to Parliamentary Procedure
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Is the committee content with the instruments?
No member has indicated that they are not content or that they wish to speak, so we are agreed.
11:57 Meeting continued in private until 12:35.Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Instruments subject to Affirmative Procedure
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Agenda item 4 is consideration of affirmative instruments.
Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee
Instruments subject to Affirmative Procedure
Meeting date: 14 December 2021
Stuart McMillan
Is the committee content with the draft regulations?
No member has indicated that they are not content or that they wish to speak, so we are agreed.
