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 2643 contributions
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Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 15 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
That was very useful. Any further detail that you have on the just transition work will be of particular interest to this committee. I agree with your point that workers need to be at the heart of the conversation on such a transition.
My final question is about the road equivalent tariff, and I will go back to Gordon Martin to ask it. In your submission, Gordon, you stopped short of saying that RET should be scrapped, but you made quite a good case for that to happen. Some people in island communities might agree with you on that, given RET’s impact on demand and so on. Is that your position? If it is, should the Government consider something different from RET that could do the same thing but in a slightly different way and without the unintended consequences? I am interested in fleshing out whether you have a fixed view on RET.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 15 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
In answer to a previous question, Gordon, you said that you felt that unions and ferry workers have been cut out of the procurement process. Do you want to say more about that? Has there been no engagement at all with workers and unions, or has engagement been ineffective or badly handled? I will bring in Martyn Gray after you have responded.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Ferry Services Inquiry
Meeting date: 15 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
Thank you—that was very useful.
Moving on to climate targets, I noted the comment in the RMT submission that there is no maritime sector transition plan for how we are going to meet net zero in respect of that part of our transport emissions. How would you like to see such a sector plan develop? Are there any particular challenges that you would zoom in on at this point? I go back to Gordon Martin on that.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 10 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
The working time directive, which we have perhaps all taken for granted, is a useful example.
Does Mr Clancy or Mr Livingstone want to respond, too?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 10 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
I suppose that there is a wider context here, with, for example, the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill and the potential removal of environmental assessment procedures and so on signalling a shift in policy.
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 10 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
Does that, in effect, invite courts to second guess the direction of policy and the direction of political decisions about environmental legislation, for example? I go back to the habitats directives. Obviously, a vast amount of case law has come on the back of those that relates to consideration of the public interest test and other aspects. Does that require courts to look at what might be coming on to the statute books and where things are going, or is the temptation always going to be to look back at the 50 years of progress and say that that is part of the “proper development” of the law?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill
Meeting date: 10 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
I am interested in how the status of retained EU case law might change as a result of the bill. I was struck by the points that are made in a number of the submissions, including that from the Faculty of Advocates, about how the status of retained case law might be diminished in some way if it was judged that that case law might restrict
“the proper development of domestic law”.
I do not have in my mind what the “proper development” of domestic law would be, in the minds of ministers. Could you expand on that? It would be useful if you could give particular examples to colour that scenario.
I will start with Dr Hood and then move on to other witnesses.
Meeting of the Parliament
Forestry (Contribution to Net Zero)
Meeting date: 9 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
I recognise the member’s interest in riparian woodlands. Does she recognise that the growth of deer populations severely impacts our riparian woodlands, which is exactly why the Government needs to take on the recommendations of the deer working group and bring population numbers down?
Meeting of the Parliament
Forestry (Contribution to Net Zero)
Meeting date: 9 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
If there is time in hand, Presiding Officer, I would like to take an intervention from Mr Ewing.
Meeting of the Parliament
Forestry (Contribution to Net Zero)
Meeting date: 9 November 2022
Mark Ruskell
It is clear that the sharp impact of the climate and nature emergencies is reminding us every day that the window for action is closing. We must work together to reshape our relationship with nature if we are to avoid those tipping points of the collapse of nature and our climate. I am proud that, with Greens now working as part of the Government, the restoration and expansion of Scotland’s native woodlands is happening on an unprecedented scale.
As we have already heard from Jenni Minto, native woodlands are the strongest of the nature-based solutions that we have to capture emissions and move us ever closer to the target of net zero by 2045. The Woodland Trust’s report, “State of the UK’s Woods and Trees 2021”, shows that ancient woodlands in Scotland hold 30 per cent more carbon compared with the average carbon stocks for other woodland types. Although all woodlands have important roles to play, expanding our ancient woods will not only lock up carbon but provide a home for the wildlife that is struggling right now to adapt to climate change.
