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
Scottish Government Priorities
Meeting date: 19 September 2023
Edward Mountain
I am looking around to see whether there are any more questions, but before you think that it is all over, minister, I want to go back to ferries and just clarify what the committee report said. I want to make it absolutely clear that we said that we agreed with the direct award of the contract
“provided this arrangement is acceptable to communities and there are no legal barriers.”
That was the caveat in the report. However, Angus Campbell, who is on the ferries community board, said that that was not acceptable to communities. How are you going to square that circle with less than 16 months to go?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Scottish Government Priorities
Meeting date: 19 September 2023
Edward Mountain
I want to be clear in my understanding of the situation. If the ferries community board gets the board of CalMac replaced, it is happy to recommend a direct award or contract. Is that what you are saying?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Scottish Government Priorities
Meeting date: 19 September 2023
Edward Mountain
It really is all over now, minister. Thank you for giving evidence to the committee this morning.
I suspend the meeting briefly to allow the minister to leave. Committee members should be back in five minutes, please.
12:00 Meeting suspended.12:05 On resuming—
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 19 September 2023
Edward Mountain
Welcome back, everyone. Our next item of business is consideration of a type 1 consent notification for the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023 (Revocation and Sunset Disapplication) Regulations 2023. This is a proposed UK statutory instrument where the UK Government is seeking the Scottish Government’s consent to legislate in an area of devolved competence.
On 5 September, the Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Net Zero and Just Transition notified the committee of the UK SI. The committee’s role is to decide whether it agrees with the Scottish Government’s proposal to consent to the UK Government’s making those regulations within devolved competence, and in the manner that the UK Government has indicated to the Scottish Government.
If members are content for consent to be given, the committee will write to the Scottish Government accordingly. In writing to the Scottish Government, we have the option to pose questions or to ask to be kept up to date on relevant developments. I remind committee members that we have written to the Scottish Government and the UK Government in relation to the SI, asking for responses within a reasonable timeframe, which I believe expires tomorrow.
Do members have any views, questions or comments?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Scottish Government Priorities
Meeting date: 19 September 2023
Edward Mountain
So, peatlands may fall within Màiri McAllan’s portfolio, but the land reform side of it, if there is land reform on peatlands, will fall within your portfolio.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Scottish Government Priorities
Meeting date: 19 September 2023
Edward Mountain
Thank you, minister. Last week, we clarified who is in charge of what aspects of the ferries and you are in charge of actually making them work rather than the purchase and management of vessels 801 and 802 before they come into service. I am happy with that.
When it comes to major transport infrastructure, there seems to be a separation of responsibilities. Roads infrastructure falls to you, but active travel and cycling infrastructure falls to Mr Harvie. How will you take that into account? How do you work together on delivery—say, on the small bit of A9 dualling that is now out for tender?
10:30Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Scottish Government Priorities
Meeting date: 19 September 2023
Edward Mountain
Thank you, minister. Those were the easy questions. We now turn to the difficult questions, starting with some from Mark Ruskell.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Edward Mountain
Minister, I am sorry, but with the greatest respect, you have just stated another untruth. In Scotland’s male close seasons, you shoot male deer during the rut process, but after the rut you give them a chance to recover. It is a pity—and really disappointing—that you have made that comment, because that is the second thing that proves a lack of knowledge about how to manage deer.
Stags can now be shot just as they are going into the rut; on 20 October, when they have come out of the rut and are coming back to the lowlands to recover so that they can last the winter, they go out of season. It is a similar situation with roe deer—they rut in August, and they are then allowed to recover after the rut before they go into the winter.
I am sorry, but I do not accept what you say, and I find it hugely disrespectful to the animals that you are talking about that you do not know when they are currently being shot in Scotland.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Edward Mountain
I am suitably chastised, convener, and on that note I will keep my questions and comments for when I speak to my motion to annul. I just feel passionately about the subject, and it is really important that we are factually correct when we deal with the welfare of animals.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Edward Mountain
I am glad that you clarified that that is in the good practice guidelines. Not a single member of the Scottish Animal Welfare Commission—not a single one of them—is a deer management practitioner. They include a World Federation for Animals officer, animal welfare officers, veterinarians, police and lecturers, but not a single one has practised deer management on a large scale. That concerns me because, at the end of the day, all of us as parliamentarians must ensure the welfare of the animals that we are killing in order to protect our natural land.
