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: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
I want to build on Monica Lennon’s point about where the balance of responsibilities should lie. On heat in buildings, local authorities have been tasked with devising local heat and energy efficiency strategies that will, no doubt, identify where there are opportunities for mass retrofitting of certain housing stock, establishing district heating schemes and so on. Is the governance around that working? Will the progress that is being made drive investor certainty? Is there the right balance of responsibilities, with local government identifying streets and opportunities on the ground, and national Government setting the overall strategy and a regulatory framework for investment? I realise that you probably do not want to comment on policy choices, but does that framework for dividing actions and responsibilities work?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
On the role of Government support for individual householders, do you have reflections on how the Energy Savings Trust and Home Energy Scotland are operating at the moment? How effective are they, and what is their capacity, given the scale of the challenge that we face?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Thanks for that. I am sure that there is more work for this committee to do on that as well.
The third area of that work is the net zero test. We understand that the Government is now piloting a net zero test. Do you have any thoughts on the progress of that work, including on where it is beginning, what the early outcomes are and the prospects of ensuring that the whole of Government is able to apply that test whenever it is making balanced decisions?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
I will ask about the joint budget review work between the Parliament and the Scottish Government. The first strand of that work has already been delivered and there is a narrative on climate alongside the budget. This year, a taxonomy has been introduced that attempts to classify areas of spend and an annex has been attached to the budget. Is that piece of work meaningful, or is there room for improvement? What is your assessment of it?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Just to be clear, though, do you see the net zero test as an absolutely critical part of how the Government mainstreams climate thinking across all departments?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
I also want to ask about the role of impartial information in allowing businesses and individuals to make choices. I note that, in its letter, which came out at the weekend, the regulatory review group on heat in buildings talks about
“The opportunity for public misunderstanding”
and
“conflicting messages ... coming in from a variety of sources including the media”.
What are your thoughts on how the Government can ensure clarity of message, given the speculation that there often is in the media and given that vested interests will argue against particular policies that conflict with their own businesses? It can be quite confusing and difficult for the public to get a genuinely impartial view on what the best options might be for them.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Clearly, the risk register shows that there needs to be work on public awareness and access to impartial information.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
Okay.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
On the back of that, I would be interested to hear whether you feel that the Government is making enough progress on systemic change. Systemic change might not come up in relation to the progress that is made from year to year to meet annual carbon reductions, but it might point to increasing capacity and more of a change in systems that would deliver progress in the years to come and beyond 2030. We might also consider the relevance of that for the 2045 target. We are looking at big, systemic changes. Is Government on track to turn that supertanker around?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 12 March 2024
Mark Ruskell
So, there might be a point when the net zero test has been piloted in a particular department that would allow for reflection about how it has driven certain decisions or improved decision making.