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 570 contributions
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
Mr Bibby makes my point: there is no certainty until the votes have been cast. Given that there are some weeks for Mr Bibby to listen to what is, I hope, the very persuasive case that I am making for the Scottish Government’s culture budget, I hope that he can be tempted to vote for it.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
Whoever is inferring that would be incorrect. I stand by the comments that I made. However, I think that the number is higher than the one that you put to me.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
For the third time, for the benefit of Mr Kerr, the remit of the review will be agreed. It has not yet been agreed. It will be agreed with Dame Sue, who is leading the review, and me, and that is yet to happen.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
No. I agree with Robert Wilson. For a third time, if not a fourth time—
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
I have just outlined the two—
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
Frankly, I hope that Dame Sue will also consider how we can work in partnership. We have done that, but we need to think about whether we can do more, working with the likes of local government, to ensure that our infrastructure is retained—or retained for the best purpose for 2025 and the future—and to ensure the delivery of cultural policies, whether those relate to music tuition or anything else.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
One area for which we have a budget allocation this year, which we have not had until now, is a culture and heritage capacity fund. That could provide some very useful help and support to organisations that might not have the capacity for, expertise in, or insight into how to diversify or build more resilience into themselves.
I am really interested in the matter. At the heart of what Mr Adam is pointing to is the fact that, although some organisations are early adopters of doing things in new ways, reviewing how they operate and working out how they can access more funding streams, that might be more of a challenge for other organisations. A fund that will support organisations through that process is a really good thing at a time of change, and £4 million has been allocated to it.
09:45There is a lot of thinking in Creative Scotland about organisations that will be funded on a multiyear basis, but also about organisations that will not. How can one help those organisations to get themselves to a place where they may be considered for multiyear funding in future rounds, or where they have the help and support that they need in order to become more commercially successful, better able to get income from other sources or better able to use certain kinds of technology?
That, in part, is what I am saying about the budget being not just about foundational funding change, but about helping with change in organisations so that they are on a firmer footing and able to do what they want to do.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
Maybe Mr Kerr was about to talk about the budget itself—
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
—and the budget lines in relation to capital. The capital allocation for the National Galleries of Scotland is going up from £4.1 million to £6.2 million. It is important and right that NGS receives more money, because of the pressures that Mr Kerr has outlined. However, as I said in my opening statement, I acknowledge that not everything will be sorted to everybody’s satisfaction in one year. That is why we have committed to raising funding by the amount that we have committed to raising it and to doing so as quickly as possible.
I also said a few moments ago that there is more to be done on the capital allocation. I think that I am right in saying that the National Galleries of Scotland finished its maintenance review in November, which was after the budget considerations were made. I will look closely at all reports from our cultural organisations that require capital support, including the National Galleries of Scotland, and my officials will work closely with that organisation and others to make sure that we can support them all as well as we possibly can.
Dealing with the challenges that we are dealing with at present is a case of doing much more than hoping. We are providing extra resource and support, and we are working closely with all the organisations that are dealing with such challenges. I will be making the strongest case that I can for more capital funding. We have secured a significant increase in funding this year, and we have largely put that into a project that would probably have failed without that support.
If there are any other such projects or any institutions that are suffering from such challenges—there have been a number and, incidentally, they have not closed, because we acted—we will deal with them not on the basis of hope but on the basis of understanding the nature of the challenge and working out what resources are at our disposal. I have signalled that capital funding is a particular challenge, but, notwithstanding that, we have tried to do everything that we can to help organisations. That was the case with the V&A in Dundee, where we intervened to support it as an important institution in Scotland. If there are—
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 16 January 2025
Angus Robertson
It is for my colleagues to make the case about other parts of Government spending. In relation to the culture budget, however, I really think that this year’s culture budget proposals are transformational and important, and that the sector is expecting, and hoping, that the budget be passed. I share that hope. However, as I have said, I have been at this long enough to know that one knows the result of the vote only when one actually sees it.
I think that the budget will have a transformational impact. At the same time, we are thinking about what changes need to happen in relation to the administration of, and support for, the culture sector more generally. That is why I repeat my point that I am genuinely interested in hearing colleagues’ specific proposals.
My one takeaway for all colleagues, beyond this meeting, is that they should have a look at the survey that has been circulated and share their views. I am sure that Dame Sue will take it all very seriously.