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 2616 contributions
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
I return to the issue of escalation. The First Minister’s letter of last week rightly focused on the situation in Gaza, but we are also aware from an increasing number of news reports of the illegal displacement of Palestinians in the west bank, and there could be an unfolding humanitarian crisis there in time. What is your assessment of that? How does that impact on the Scottish Government’s response, whether through a forthcoming resettlement scheme or other humanitarian efforts? Are you factoring in the potential for a crisis that goes much beyond what we are seeing in Gaza at the moment?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
A number of communities across Scotland have formal civic links with communities in Palestine. I have noted that Dundee is twinned with Nablus and that Glasgow is twinned with Bethlehem, while Stirling has had an informal twinning with a refugee community in Jerusalem. To what extent can those informal and more civic links be used to address the humanitarian crisis that could unfold?
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
To ask the First Minister how the Scottish Government is making public transport more affordable. (S6F-02494)
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
The local community has made a really good case for bringing a station back to Newburgh, proposing a low-cost modular station that would be of great benefit. Does the minister agree that the new modular stations have an important role to play in expanding Scotland’s rail network and that developing one at Newburgh could be a trailblazer for developments that could benefit other communities?
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
In response to the inquiry, the charity Living Streets highlighted the accessibility challenges that are faced by people who walk, wheel and cycle and who then want to integrate their journeys with the tram. Are there lessons to be learned about how those groups will be engaged with and their needs taken into account in the design and procurement processes of future transport projects?
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
To ask the Scottish Government what support is available to residents who have been required to evacuate their properties due to deteriorating reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete. (S6O-02678)
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
I thank the First Minister for outlining those successes. Free bus travel has been described as life saving for people seeking asylum. When those people, having escaped from persecution, war and suffering, are forced to live on just £6 a day, the very least that we can do is extend a hand of help.
Does the First Minister agree that it is our responsibility to use the full extent of our powers to welcome those who are forced to flee their homes? Does he agree that, by extending free bus travel to people seeking asylum, we are showing that we are a country and a Parliament that are proud to protect all those who seek safety here?
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 2 November 2023
Mark Ruskell
I thank the cabinet secretary for that response and note her awareness of the situation in Tillicoultry. I understand that Clackmannanshire Council suspects that more than 100 other residences in the same area could also be seriously affected. What engagement has there been between Clackmannanshire Council and the Scottish Government? Has there been correspondence about the dire situation that some residents are in at the moment? How is the Scottish Government preventing affected residents across Scotland from remaining in temporary accommodation indefinitely while they await the outcome of building assessments and potential remedial works?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 31 October 2023
Mark Ruskell
I am interested to know whether Scottish Water sets a maximum ratio between the highest-paid and the lowest-paid workers and what that is.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 31 October 2023
Mark Ruskell
We are very aware of that approach; the question is whether what you have planned will be enough in the future. If you think that there will be even more extreme weather events, do you need to scale that up? Will that be adequate?