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 521 contributions
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Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
It does not feel safe. Am I right in thinking that night shooting really only happens out of season? In the summer, there are long days and lots of light.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
What research has been carried out into the safety of the process? To me, having people going around at night shooting things seems inherently unsafe. People walk around and go into forests at night. What research has been done to ensure that people cannot be inadvertently shot?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
I am thinking about the safety of people. You are talking about issues to do with animals.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Bracken Control
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
When will those be available?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
I am getting a little more concerned as I hear the evidence. Most out-of-season deer management is carried out by Forestry and Land Scotland, which is a Government agency. It applies to NatureScot, which is a Government agency, for a licence to do that. It appears that NatureScot just ticks the box and gives permission. There seems to be very little evidence of NatureScot trying to encourage the Government agency Forestry and Land Scotland, far less anybody else, to amend its practice to keep within the spirit of the law. I am getting really concerned that the measure is just about convenience and that very little thought has been given to, first, the food chain and, secondly, animal welfare.
What checks and balances are in the system? You have said that the reason for introducing the legislation is that the out-of-season management happens anyway and that the legislation will cut down on administrative burden. However, it seems to me that the administrative burden has never been doing its job, because the two Government agencies are working hand in hand to make life easy for one another.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
How many of the deer that are culled out of season go into the food chain?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Bracken Control
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
There are reasons why we need to control bracken, including the environmental damage that it causes. It is also quite dangerous to human health, not only because of the ticks that inhabit it but because it causes cancers. It is a no-win situation if we cannot control it.
When do you expect that the James Hutton Institute will come back to you, which will allow us to look at the issue in more detail? What alternatives are available just now? It is spreading as we speak, so doing nothing is not an option. The situation will be different—it will be worse—when we are in a position to do something about it, so it is quite concerning that nothing will happen until a policy is worked up, which will take a long time.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Bracken Control
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
Sorry to interrupt, but can we get a timeline as well? The timeline is important.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 13 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
I have a supplementary question about the percentage of deer that are killed out of season. You said that nearly 50 per cent of culled stags are killed out of season. What is the percentage of culled hinds that are killed out of season?
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Continued Petitions
Meeting date: 6 September 2023
Rhoda Grant
Thank you for giving me the chance to speak to the petitions. I cannot stress enough how vital the links in question are to the west Highlands. They link the Highland Council area to the Western Isles. They are seen as links to Uig on Skye and to Uist, so they are incredibly important.
You referred to what the then Minister for Transport said about the STPR and how the A890 did not wholly meet the criteria for inclusion in the trunk road network. I do not understand that, because local communities use it to access healthcare and education, and it is also used for tourism, farming, aquaculture and renewables. It is a freight link to the Western Isles and it is on the north coast 500; as we all know, that has been incredibly successful in encouraging tourists into the area but it has put huge pressure on the road. I believe that the A890 is of national significance because of that.
You mentioned the submissions from Lochcarron community council and the Plockton and district community council, which highlight how important the A890 is to the area. If the road is closed, the detour involves going from the west coast to the east coast and back. That is a detour of 140 miles. A child from Lochcarron who goes to Plockton high school will have to double back, adding 280 miles to their daily commute to high school, which is totally unacceptable. That happens often, often for long periods of time. Therefore, I do not understand the then minister’s reluctance to adopt the A890 as a trunk road. We should also think about the extra carbon that is emitted when the freight that uses that route has to travel an additional 280 miles, which is certainly not good for the planet.
Highland Council has made it clear that it is keen to do something about the situation, but it simply does not have the money. Last year, it spent more than £700,000 trying to deal with the rock falls. This year, it expects to spend £1.5 million on that. The council has not been able to make any progress on the options appraisal that it carried out.
I believe that the roads in question meet the criteria for a national strategic link and that the Government should therefore consider making them trunk roads. Given that we are two transport ministers on from when the most recent response was received, I suggest that the committee should write to the current transport minister to ask her to consider the petitions. I think that the A890 is of national significance and is significant in the context of the Scottish Government’s duty to ensure that children are educated. The issue of children not being able to get to school because of rock falls was an issue when I was at school; it has been going on for some time. At some point, there will be a horrendous accident, because the road is dangerous—people who use it take their life in their hands. The current situation is simply not good enough.
The local people do not care who is responsible. It is clear that Highland Council does not have the money to do the work that is necessary because of the cuts in local government finance. People need to have safe roads. If the Scottish Government is not willing to adopt the A890 as a trunk road, it should seek to make capital available to make it safe or to reroute it along a safer route.
I know that the committee will be tempted to close the petition because it has had a response from the Scottish Government, but I ask it to write to the Scottish Government again, given the national significance of the route and its importance to education, to ask it to change its mind, or to at least consider how it could assist.
