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 606 contributions
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Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
On the point about reliability, Aviemore might have triggered only one cold weather payment—or maybe none—this winter, but, in other years, it could be looking at three or four. Is extra help available to people in such places if there is a very bad winter?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
I thought you were going to ask that. It is exactly what I am about to address. Is it going to go far? No. We must be clear, however, that energy does not need to cost that much. I would much prefer that the UK Government took some action on energy companies instead of allowing them to take advantage of the situation and bankroll their eye-watering profits. If we are going to listen to criticism today about there being not enough social security going to the problem, we need at least to acknowledge the cause.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
That would be the ideal scenario.
Pam Duncan-Glancy mentioned a “finger in a dam”, but we need at least to ask why there is a flood. More money will be spent on the scheme than was spent on cold weather payments. More of my constituents are going to benefit from it, as will more of hers. It is not the only measure that is aimed at supporting people through the winter. There is also the fuel insecurity fund, the islands cost crisis emergency fund and other benefits that are being delivered by Social Security Scotland. People who are in receipt of those are therefore not going to receive £50 only. That £50 is more of a winter uplift of sorts.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
Finally, we heard last week that those with the greatest need for help in paying energy bills are affected by other issues such as needing energy efficiency measures in their home and improvements in the wider context of UK energy policy. How is the minister working with other portfolios in Government to make sure that there is investment to reduce the need for social security?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
Since last week’s meeting, we have had some helpful information from the Scottish Parliament information centre about which weather stations have triggered cold weather payments in the past, and how many times. Six of the seven areas with the highest level of fuel poverty are in my region—the Highlands and Islands—but some of those areas, such as Stornoway, have not triggered any cold weather payment in many years. Where they have done so—for example, in Wick, Lerwick and Kirkwall—there tends to be one trigger a year, despite the challenges that exist there. Will the winter heating payment be a move in the right direction in tackling fuel poverty?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
Thanks, minister.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
A few colleagues have talked about the coldest parts of Scotland but have often missed out my region, the Highlands and Islands. We must be clear: cold weather payments are not going to the coldest places in Scotland. They are certainly not going to the coldest homes in Scotland. Rather, they are going to the coldest weather stations. The minister addressed the fact that wind chill is not measured and that six days of -2°C will not trigger a payment. The people who struggle the most with energy bills in my region are in the Western Isles, the Northern Isles and areas of the Highlands. They have not been getting cold weather payments, but they are going to get £50 this winter.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
I want to go back to the timeline issue, because the minister touched on the data. Could he outline, first, what preparations are taking place at Social Security Scotland in order to be ready to make the payments in February and say how reliance on the DWP for that data adds complexity to the delivery?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 15 December 2022
Emma Roddick
Yes, I support a stronger windfall tax than what has been proposed.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 8 December 2022
Emma Roddick
That is really clear. We need to recognise that -1°C will feel like -1°C in a lot of places but that, in many island and rural communities, it will feel like -5°C and there is no protection from wind. Will the winter heating payment be easier to build on than the cold weather payment? What would you like to see happen to make it more effective at tackling fuel poverty?
