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 918 contributions
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
I want to ask a couple of final questions about the technicalities of the collection of the visitor levy. Let us look at the Edinburgh proposition. There will be a 5 per cent levy, and the council will allow accommodation providers to retain 2 per cent of that, but there will be 20 per cent VAT on top of that. Would it not be better just to charge 3 per cent? The key concern of providers is that they will have to put their prices up in a way that is beyond their control. The council would get the same amount of money if it just charged a 3 per cent levy and the accommodation providers would be able to charge a lower price. Would that not be simpler?
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
Sorry—you need to say that again.
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
It is 2 per cent of the total amount that they are collecting.
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
Thank you for your thoroughness on that, and welcome to the committee.
As much as we welcome Stephen Kerr to the committee, it is also sad to see Jamie Halcro Johnson leave. I am sure that all committee members will join me in thanking him for his contributions and wishing him well in whichever new committee he finds himself.
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
As a guide, I note that we will aim to conclude this panel at about quarter to 11. I turn to Gordon MacDonald.
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
I thank the panel for all their contributions. We will have a brief suspension to allow the panels to switch over.
10:52 Meeting suspended.Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
Stephen Kerr has a supplementary question.
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
Can I come in on that? I would very gently like to push back on that. It may be complicated to arrive at an answer, but one fundamental point that needs to be addressed is the price elasticity of demand. That is, if you are putting up the price by 5 per cent, what will that do to demand? Is that an assessment that you are recommending be made?
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
Edinburgh is going to put up the price of accommodation by 5 per cent. That is the decision that the council has made. Has the council assessed what that will do to visitor demand?
Economy and Fair Work Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 3 September 2025
Daniel Johnson
Stephen Kerr, do you want to ask questions?