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.
Filter your results Hide all filters
Displaying 1692 contributions
|
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
National Outcomes
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
Recently, the Cabinet Secretary for Constitution, External Affairs and Culture made a statement about utilising global citizens in the diaspora, which Ireland has done particularly well. Do you think that the Scottish population who lives here engages in that process? Is there more that we can do to enthuse citizens in Scotland?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
Apologies for the delay, which was due to technical issues. I believe that the cabinet secretary will now appear in audio-only format. Cabinet secretary, we missed most of the answer to the previous question. Did you want to say anything more?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
I remember taking evidence, early doors, on the possibility of raising the minimum unit price in line with inflation and there being concern that, although it was before Brexit legislation, the internal market act might open it up to legal challenge. Do you have any thoughts on that?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
Welcome back to the committee again, cabinet secretary. We lost you briefly. Do you want to continue with your answer to Mr Ruskell’s question?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
I have a quick final question, cabinet secretary. The committee undertook significant work on the original REUL bill, and one of our major concerns was about its impact on other organisations, such as animal welfare organisations, that are trying to navigate their way through it. We were also concerned about Scottish Parliament subject committees, which will also be interested in what is happening and want to engage with the process. Although I note that you said that the removal of the sunset clause is a move in the right direction, do the timescales and the approach alleviate any of the pressures on business and third sector organisations, and do they affect the ability of the Scottish Parliament to engage in the scrutiny process?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
I thank the cabinet secretary and his officials for attending. We now move into private session.
11:21 Meeting continued in private until 11:31.Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
National Outcomes
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
It is worth pointing out that, as convener, I was with the Presiding Officer at the Nordic Council this year, and the committee has tried to engage—to look north as well as to Europe—post-Brexit.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
National Outcomes
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
A number of members have supplementary questions, I hope. I am conscious that Mr Ruskell has not come in yet. Do you want to come in now, Mark, or are you asking about a different topic?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
Our third agenda item is an evidence session on the supplementary legislative consent memorandum on the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill. We are joined remotely by Angus Robertson, Cabinet Secretary for the Constitution, External Affairs and Culture, and, from the Scottish Government, Elliot Robertson, head of the EU secretariat; Chris Nicholson, solicitor and head of the constitutional reform and external affairs branch; and Greig Walker, retained EU law management programme lead. I invite the cabinet secretary to make a brief opening statement.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
National Outcomes
Meeting date: 1 June 2023
Clare Adamson
I will turn briefly to the discourse on international offices and missions and will direct my question to Professor Jackson. We prepared a consensual report on the reach of international offices that was very positive. In its submission, the British Council said that it would welcome more offices being opened around the world. The political discourse in the chamber is very difficult—there have been questions about the costs of offices and whether they are a waste of money, and there have been suggestions that they are pretend embassies. Mr Cleverly has intervened by writing to Mr Robertson, and Mr Robertson has asked him to withdraw any indication that those offices are being misused or that the Scottish Government should be curtailed in its use of them. You mentioned that that would almost be unheard of in Canada. Are there other examples of sub-state Governments being at odds with their national Government? Is that not unusual?
