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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Displaying 772 contributions
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Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
I do not feel qualified to answer that question.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
I am aware that you asked that question two weeks ago, and the response was that active recruitment is happening at the moment. I should point out that there are urology specialists in Scotland, and they can provide support as and when required. I am afraid that I cannot give you a timeframe, but I have been informed about the situation and it has been underlined that this is a key appointment that people are working to progress.
I agree with you that women should be able to approach their GPs regularly with whatever concerns they have and get the right support, which I know GPs can provide.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
I agree that waiting times of that length must be incredibly difficult for the women who are waiting for the referral and for the discussions to find out what their best pathway is—the best course of action that they can be offered for what is a very debilitating and pretty awful situation to find themselves in.
My officials correspond and meet regularly with the health boards and NSS to ensure that everyone is across the pathways and understands the need to ensure that this is done with the patient at the centre of it, which is how we would hope to achieve any improvement in waiting lists. As Greig Chalmers indicated earlier, the whole system has been improved by listening to those who are waiting in order to improve their experiences while they are waiting. We have introduced a waiting well plan, and, in my role as women’s health minister, I am looking at how that can be connected into the women’s health plan.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
If I recall correctly, the evidence that the committee received two weeks ago indicated that the pathway is clearly laid out and that there is an electronic referral to the GG&C complex mesh surgical service. That is the clear pathway that has been introduced. Greig Chalmers would like to comment on that.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
My understanding is that there is a clear pathway. I saw it when I was on the NHS Inform website this morning. I have a copy of it here, and it is described as the complex mesh surgical service pathway. I would be happy to submit it to the committee after this evidence session.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
First, I thank the convener and the committee for inviting me along and for recognising the quite dramatic experiences that women have had as a result of transvaginal mesh surgery.
It is clear that, when we started setting up the surgery system for women who have been impacted, we wanted to design the processes with those women in mind and ensure that we did the right thing for them. There have been lots of discussions and surveys with women who have been impacted to find out how they feel the service should operate. Taking that learning on board has been incredibly important.
There is some advice on the NHS Inform website, but creating pamphlet literature to support women is incredibly important. We have listened to the women in order to ensure that it contains the right information, whether it is about the pathways for the referral system in the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde service or the independent service.
I am pleased that we have listened to the women and are able to provide them with the information that they have highlighted is needed.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
I am afraid that I cannot, but Greig Chalmers might be able to.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
NSS has been sending out information to health boards, each of which has an individual who has been tasked with the responsibility of ensuring that there is an understanding of the complex mesh service in their health board area.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
I refer the member to my earlier answer about the responsible officers in each health board, who have direct contact with NSS and the complex mesh surgical service.
Health, Social Care and Sport Committee
Complex Mesh Surgical Service
Meeting date: 16 May 2023
Jenni Minto
To be fair, we are learning from the women who have experienced the situation that a lot of services could be improved. That is why I know that a lot of listening has been done. I appreciate that, at the start of this process, the women did not feel as though they were being listened to. So, to support them even more, listening has been absolutely key.
If anyone has experienced surgery, they will know that the best information that they can get is as much information as can be given, and a simple letter is sometimes not enough. That is why post-surgery phone calls to women have been introduced. That is incredibly important. I have suffered some surgery, and I know that you really do not take on board what people are saying during the first 24 hours after surgery. So, we need to find ways of keeping women more informed after their surgery.
It is also important to keep their families informed, because that is where the women’s main support will be once they have left the hospital environment. Improvements can be made, and I hope that that will happen. We have talked about the accountable officers in the health boards and how sending additional information to GPs should provide the level of support that women rightly expect.
