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.
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
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.
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.
There are two types of keyword search:
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.
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
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:
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.
Displaying 1221 contributions
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 16 April 2024
Liz Smith
—and what I am asking in relation to the title that you presented the committee with, which is the issue that we want to delve into, is whether your specific role would raise questions about the overall strategy for commissioners in general. I am asking whether that came up, either in your own research or with the people to whom you spoke.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 16 April 2024
Liz Smith
I fully understand that you have been examining one specific aspect; indeed, you have said so several times now. However, have questions not been raised about the overall role of commissioners and their respective staff and how they are serving Scotland? Has that not come through your research at all?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 16 April 2024
Liz Smith
Good morning, Ms MacMillan. You have made it very clear that you had a specific remit, which was about advocacy for those with a disability and autism and in relation to their vulnerability. Nonetheless, the title of your report from March 2023 is “The role of commissions and commissioners in Scotland and the UK”. Does it strike you that your very specific remit does not quite fit with that title?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 26 March 2024
Liz Smith
It would be very helpful if we could get details on when we might expect the revised financial memorandum, convener.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 26 March 2024
Liz Smith
Thank you very much.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 26 March 2024
Liz Smith
That would be very helpful.
I want to pursue a related issue. I do not know how many framework bills we have in the Parliament just now, but there are a lot. My understanding is that, from a Scottish Government perspective, one of the reasons for framework bills is to try to ensure that there is as much discussion as possible between the Government and relevant stakeholders to co-design—I think that that is the term that the Scottish Government uses. In other words, we have a better chance of getting good legislation if the stakeholders have had really good input into it. That is my understanding, and I think that that is the committee’s understanding. The problem is that the co-design process goes on beyond the publication of the financial memorandum, as you have just shown us, and beyond the initial stages of the legislation. Do you accept that that is also a problem, as it means that, if the process of suggestions coming in about the bill is still on-going, we will be unable to decide what the costs will be?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 26 March 2024
Liz Smith
I have a question, which is one of clarification. Professor Roy, you raised an interesting point about future Scottish budgets and said that it would be helpful if we could see the numbers on how much has been spent to mitigate climate change. Should that be done within each portfolio of the existing budget, or are you suggesting that there should be another section in the Scottish budget that shows a cumulative total?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 26 March 2024
Liz Smith
That is very helpful. I asked the question because, as you know, there have been quite a few situations in which we have questioned how easy it is to track money through the Scottish budget. It is good to know from your expertise whether that is better done in one unit or throughout the system.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 26 March 2024
Liz Smith
Why did you originally consider it appropriate not to provide us with an updated financial memorandum until after stage 2? Where is the logic in that?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Meeting date: 26 March 2024
Liz Smith
From a practical angle, I understand that the Criminal Justice Committee is taking stage 1 evidence on the bill just now. Is that correct?