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 514 contributions
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 2 October 2024
Rhoda Grant
Fisheries Management Scotland told the committee that it continues to receive reports about escaped juveniles from freshwater farms appearing in rivers, yet no escapes have been reported to the fish health inspectorate. Can you explain that discrepancy, and what action the industry is taking to prevent such escapes?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 2 October 2024
Rhoda Grant
Okay, but the farm did not know that the fish had escaped. It did not report an escape.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 2 October 2024
Rhoda Grant
I have one further question. Do you expect the processing site to reopen? I have visited it and have seen the skills of the workforce there. The staff will have moved on and, I hope, found other jobs. How do you protect a workforce with that level of skill and rebuild it after closure?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 2 October 2024
Rhoda Grant
Perhaps we could write to you about that. I am sorry for putting you on the spot but it was worth asking the question while you were here.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 2 October 2024
Rhoda Grant
I have been listening to the responses, which make it clear that freshwater treatments have been beneficial, but I am picking up a wee bit of reluctance. I understand that fish handling is an issue, but I am hearing concern that possible future regulation might make that a requirement, rather than something to be done when the need arises.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 2 October 2024
Rhoda Grant
Thank you.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 25 September 2024
Rhoda Grant
The real concern is about the timeframe. In the farming community, there are already concerns about the length of time that it is taking to produce the rural support plan and all the bits that are attached to it.
The timeframe in the regulations creates a fear that we could still be on 2018 funding for LFASS in 2030, because, if we pass this legislation, there is nothing that the committee or the Parliament can do to change it or to force the Government to change it. That funding rate could just go on, and that is not acceptable. That is what we are trying to say loud and clear. You can give us assurances, but you cannot set it in stone that that will not happen.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 25 September 2024
Rhoda Grant
My concern in relation to an island impact assessment is that I believe that the regulations could have an impact.
The minister will be well aware that people have been talking for a long time about micro-abattoirs and the benefits—both animal welfare and economic—there would be if island communities, and smaller communities away from markets, were able to have abattoirs. They would be able to sell their own meat locally, the tourism industry would benefit, because there would be local produce available, and people could sell online. It would make for a huge economic boost.
Anything that adds to not only the cost but the bureaucracy of the process pushes all those things further and further away, and my concern is that the regulations might do that. They might just add another hurdle to get over. I am not suggesting for one moment that we are making great progress with having abattoirs—in fact, some that we have are already under threat—but the regulations could, first of all, dispense with those that are there and, secondly, stop us from getting others.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 25 September 2024
Rhoda Grant
Do you have a timescale for that?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 25 September 2024
Rhoda Grant
It would be good to get some information, because we are also hearing from industry that that is causing problems for it.
Rachael Hamilton talked about marine science being an outlier in Scotland with regard to publications. It is also an outlier internationally because it is not independent of Government. Is the current structure of marine science appropriate? Does it have sufficient resources and is it independent enough? Dr Robin Cook said to the committee:
“In laboratories across Europe and, indeed, in North America, science is managed at arm’s length from Government. The perception among other scientists is that those are more independent organisations. There is a lack of trust among people outside Government in Government science, because of the fear that it is being manipulated or influenced unduly.”—[Official Report, Rural Affairs and Islands Committee, 4 September 2024; c 23.]
How would you respond to that?