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 2643 contributions
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
Perhaps I should put it the other way around, because it seems that you are all working on delivery groups and that they are well established as part of your approach. Is it possible to have an effective approach without a delivery group? I ask that because there are councils in Scotland that have not set up delivery groups, even though they have AQMAs in place.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
Do you want to add anything on monitoring?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
I have a supplementary question for Gary Fuller about a technical issue with monitoring. When I looked at the air pollution data for Perth for the past week, I noticed that, if we average out the air pollution data over a week, it comes in under the limit value, but if we look at particular times of the day, we can see that it spikes quite strongly. Are there issues with the way in which we collate and interpret air quality data in this country?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
That leads me on to my next question, which is about those Environmental Standards Scotland recommendations on air quality action plans. There are recommendations on timescale, for example, and, as you say, new guidance will be coming out. What are your reflections on how achievable the timescales for completion will be? I will put that question to Kenny Bisset, because I know that Fife Council has won the award for the fastest production of an air quality action plan, for Cupar. I am not sure whether that is because issues are simpler in Cupar or whether it is down to the effectiveness of your teams and your process for developing the plan. What is your reaction to the ESS recommendation that there need to be timescales for production?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
Are there resources implications for producing a fast air quality action plan, such as the one that you have managed to achieve for Cupar?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
Is that an approach that you have chosen to take at the City of Edinburgh Council? Is there a quicker way of doing it?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
Yes, or maybe you could just say how you would approach it. The point that Gary Fuller was making is that what councils can do is map out what the pathways might look like. What is your response to that?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
Thanks.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
I am also asking about the wider issue of air quality management area reform.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 April 2023
Mark Ruskell
The system that we have in Scotland is one of local air quality management in local authorities. We have had quite a lot of written evidence on that. The ESS report talks about the timescales for how plans are developed, reviewed and published. Gary Fuller made comments about monitoring vulnerable people, particularly outside schools, and we have had comments from Professor Campbell Gemmell about who provides the independent oversight of air quality management areas and the plans that come from them. How can the system be improved overall? I ask Gavin Thomson to answer that first, and then anybody else who wants to comment.