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 2217 contributions
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Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Petition
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
So, the dogs have these bonds and what have you. I am interested to hear that they are not being rehomed because they have never been homed. That goes back to the point that I was trying to make earlier: the dogs are bred for a specific purpose, which is to race only, whereas my understanding—I could be wrong—is that, at the amateur track, the dogs are very much part of the family. Please do not think that I am trying to make that differentiation between the two things.
At a professional track, do the owners have insurance? If I am a pet owner and my dog gets injured, I can have pet insurance that will allow that dog to be treated, up to a certain amount. Do you have insurance? Paul, do the folk who come to your racing track insure their dogs against injury on the basis that there is a risk that the dogs will get hurt when they are going round the track?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Petition
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
That kind of goes back to the point that the convener made. We do not know how many dogs will get euthanised by the folk who come and race at your track, but we have statistics, so we can make that argument and that judgment. It goes back to the question that the convener asked: how can the committee be confident that how your track is being run will allow the committee and the wider public to have confidence that what you guys are doing meets the standards and people’s expectations around animal welfare?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
Thank you. I am pretty sure that that is the company where Professor Alice Stanton did the work on the red meat supply chains. I think that the committee will look at that.
I want to talk about profitability. Kate Rowell, this is for you. Farmers can make money in two ways. They can either sell to the market at the cost of production plus, to get a profit, or they can sell to the market and be supported by the Government so that the price of the product is not beyond the consumer’s ability to buy it. That is my understanding of the two ways in which a farm can be sustainable. What role do supermarkets play in that equation?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
I will stop there, convener.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Petition
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
Sorry—I am asking you whether I am wrong to make the assumption that, for the folk that are coming to you, the dog is part of the family—
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
When you say, “tightening the home market,” are you talking about reducing production?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
I am very disappointed that you do not mention Galloways. I do like my Galloway cow. I know that I was very specific in that. Is there anything else that others want to talk about on natural issues? I go back to traditional breeds wintering out better, rather than needing to be in sheds. Is there anything else that the rest of the panel wants to add to that?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Petition
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
Forgive me if it appeared that I was trying to demonise one side against the other; I am not. I am purely trying to get an understanding of why there is an issue about dogs racing. There clearly is an issue, because we have people petitioning to get it banned. I know, having worked with dogs my entire life, the care and attention and everything else that is put into that. Why would you then want to do something that will make that dog ill, hurt or whatever else? Working as a sheep farmer, I have had dogs killed on the farm. I understand that these things happen, but why is there a need to stop greyhound racing when people are so passionate about looking after their animals in the way that you tell me they are? Where does that issue come from?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
Convener, you asked the panel whether we could do anything with the bill. Given that Brexit is clearly the biggest cause of the lack of labour coming into the country compared to what we had previously, how could the bill alter that, given that immigration is reserved?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Future Agriculture Policy
Meeting date: 26 April 2023
Jim Fairlie
The CCC is a statutory adviser to the Scottish and UK Governments. The Scottish Parliament signed off the Climate Change Act 2019, so it is clearly part of the equation. However, I take your earlier point about the science. When we had an evidence session with the CCC, it said that older grazed grass will probably sequester less carbon, but there is no actual science on that.
When we are talking about resilience, we must talk about whether there is a long-term future for the livestock sector in Scotland, given the numbers that you have just given us. Do you know of any work that is being done to look at the science that will probably tell us that old grass sequesters less carbon?
