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
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 21 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Are there any more reflections on that point or on freedom of movement?
Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee
Meeting date: 21 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
We have discussed the restrictions on freedom of movement with previous witnesses. I was interested in what Paddy Jack said about taking on a Ukrainian staff member. Obviously they are in the UK in what are very challenging circumstances, but I just wonder to what extent freedom of movement has been an issue for your businesses.
I also want to pick up on what Gary Stephenson said about sharing the pain a bit and the fact that it is only when the pain gets shared on the UK and the EU sides that there will a meaningful discussion about how we remove some of the more bureaucratic barriers to trade and friction. What contact have you had with colleagues and trade associations in Brussels and the EU, and what role do they play? I presume that, at one point, you would have been making all the points that you have made today about testing and regulatory standards in Brussels, because you would have been part of the system where rules were being made and stakeholders were able to have an input to that. However, you are not part of that any more, but is there still solidarity between businesses in certain sectors between the UK and the EU? Are you now very much seen as being “over there”, which means that your ability to lobby for the interests of industry across Europe has been reduced? I hope that that was clear.
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 21 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Will the member give way on that point?
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 21 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
The minister has just mentioned that the UK Government has delayed its clean heat market mechanism, which is a scheme that uses reserved powers to regulate the industry to increase the installations that we desperately need. That delay came after months of briefing and counter-briefing on whether the scheme was to be scrapped altogether. The minister has just highlighted the need for certainty and clarity in regulation. Does he feel that the UK Government is really providing that?
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 21 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
I do not know whether Colin Smyth has recognised that the Greens are now a party of government. We have been influencing and working on the bill for some time, including in respect of the important provision of SSPCA powers that probably would not be in the bill had it not been for the Bute house agreement and the amazing work that the Government has done on the back of that.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 20 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
You must surely know how many dogs have gone through your kennels in recent years. You have 40 now, so how many were there two years ago? How many dogs have been moved on over that time? We need to get a sense of the throughput of dogs.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 20 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Of the dogs that you pass on—you say that that is about 10 a year—how many have injuries? Do they all have injuries, or are some of them just too old and not fast enough?
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 20 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Your opinion differs from that of the vets and cardiovascular specialists.
The GBGB figures show that there are also injuries and deaths at the track. Would you consider that level of injuries and deaths to be acceptable? Is that an acceptable risk for the dogs?
10:30Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 20 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
The only way to get zero injuries and fatalities would be if we did not race the dogs on a curved track at 40mph.
Rural Affairs and Islands Committee
Meeting date: 20 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Okay. I have a final set of questions about the number of dogs that are involved. George said earlier that he currently kennels 40 dogs. What is the throughput of dogs? How long would you normally keep a greyhound for? You mentioned that some dogs have become your family pets and are now living on the sofa. How many dogs come through the kennels from year to year? How many have come through your kennels in the past five years?