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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Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 15 November 2022
Edward Mountain
Item 3 is an evidence session for our inquiry into a modern and sustainable ferry service for Scotland. I refer members to the papers for this item. This is our fourth evidence session.
We are pleased to be joined by a panel of trade union representatives, to hear their views on ferry services. I welcome our witnesses, who are joining us remotely: Martyn Gray, executive officer, Nautilus International; and Gordon Martin, regional organiser and lead officer for CalMac Ferries at the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers.
Thank you for accepting our invitation. We will ask a series of questions. I will give you the opportunity to answer a very simple one: are you happy with the way in which CalMac recognises the hard work of your members who provide its ferry services?
We will start off with Martyn on that, to be followed by Gordon.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 15 November 2022
Edward Mountain
Okay. I will bring in the deputy convener, and then I have a final question—unless anyone else has a question.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 15 November 2022
Edward Mountain
My final question is about NorthLink Ferries, which we have not really talked about. One hears very little about it, so the assumption is that there are good relationships between employers and staff. Is that your understanding? I will also ask that question of NorthLink, when we see it, but do you have any views?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 15 November 2022
Edward Mountain
We have heard evidence that smaller ferries, and more of them, would be more responsive to island needs and would allow us to flex up and down at peak periods, rather than having one big ferry that—as with 801—can take 1,000 passengers, which is not always needed. Do the witnesses support our having smaller, more flexible ferries that could work across the entire fleet? Should we be considering that approach for our sustainable ferry services?
11:00Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 8 November 2022
Edward Mountain
Item 2 is an evidence session for our inquiry into a modern and sustainable ferry service for Scotland. Members have received briefing papers from the clerks and the Scottish Parliament information centre.
This is the third evidence session in our inquiry into Scotland’s ferry services. We are joined by business, enterprise and tourism representatives, who will share their views on ferry services: Peter Clark, deputy director of industry at the Scotch Whisky Association; Rob Dickson, director of industry and destination development at VisitScotland; and Martin Johnson, director of strategy and regional economy at Highlands and Islands Enterprise, who joins us remotely. Thank you for accepting our invitation to speak to us; we are delighted to have you here.
We have a list of members who want to ask questions, and I will start with an easy question. I will ask each witness the same question, so you will have a moment to consider your answers—except for Peter Clark, who I ask to answer first. Are our ferry services working for the industries and people you represent?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 8 November 2022
Edward Mountain
Martin Johnson is trying to get in.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 8 November 2022
Edward Mountain
Basically, there is huge pressure to get this right as soon as possible, and industries will respond to and pick up from that, but the longer the situation goes on, the more difficult it will be for those industries to survive.
That is probably a good point at which to end. I thank Peter Clark, Rob Dickson and Martin Johnson for their answers, which have been interesting. Time has flown, as it does when you are having fun and are interested in a subject.
11:01 Meeting continued in private until 12:07.Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 8 November 2022
Edward Mountain
Yesterday, we heard concern that, if new businesses came along, they would not be able to use the facilities because of the restrictions that are placed on use of facilities by current users. I do not know whether that is a problem, but we can find out.
Rob, I will paraphrase you. You said at the beginning that people do not get over a bad ferry experience quickly. A lot of people out there might have had bad experiences in the past few years. Yesterday, we heard that it will take a long time for people to get over that. How long do you think that it will take?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 8 November 2022
Edward Mountain
To build on what Liam Kerr asked about, we heard yesterday that a lot of island businesses rely on external contractors to come in and do work. They load up their vans the night before, turn up at the port in the morning to find that there is no boat and then find at the back-end of the day that the boat has been shut down because of weather conditions. People suggested that some businesses are no longer prepared to work on islands because they cannot guarantee a full day’s work and because the costs of working there are prohibitive.
Are Peter Clark and Martin Johnson hearing that from the people they represent? What are the effects on business? In the businesses that you represent, people cannot have all their own specialist skills to meet all their requirements.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 8 November 2022
Edward Mountain
I am really interested in all the answers that you are giving but I notice that the clock does not slow down with the interesting answers. I am conscious of time, so I ask everyone to bear that in mind. There are questions that I would like to ask but I will give way, rightly, to the deputy convener so that she can get her questions in and then I will see whether there is time for mine at the end, which I am sure that there will be.
