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 1694 contributions
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Economy and Fair Work Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2022-23
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Claire Baker
The next item of business is an evidence session on the Scottish Government’s 2022-23 budget. The budget was published on 9 December 2021 together with a resource spending review framework and the medium-term financial strategy. The stage 1 debate on the budget is expected to take place next week.
In today’s evidence session, we will concentrate on the areas of the budget within this committee’s remit. I welcome the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Economy, Kate Forbes MSP, who is joined by Scottish Government officials. Helena Gray is interim director of fair work, employability and skills; Richard Rollison is director for international trade and investment; and Kathleen Swift is head of the economic directorate finance unit.
As always, I ask members and witnesses to keep their questions and answers as concise as possible. I invite the cabinet secretary to make a short opening statement.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2022-23
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Claire Baker
I have a supplementary question. The committee’s recommendations to the Government mentioned the need to encourage employers to invest in employees in order to develop the skills base. You have talked about employability programmes, but the committee has evidence that, while businesses are experiencing labour shortages, the skills gap has produced an issue. Who has responsibility for that? Is there a budget line to address the skills gap, which would help with our productivity levels and our sluggish economic growth?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2022-23
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Claire Baker
I have a supplementary question on that. I think that the target is that there will be 300 employee-owned businesses by 2030. We are making slow progress towards that. Are there interim targets to drive that change? Has the work of Co-operative Development Scotland, which is delivered by Scottish Enterprise, been mainstreamed across Scottish Enterprise? Is the option to change to employee ownership or a co-operative model always considered when SE is looking to support a business?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2022-23
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Claire Baker
That is helpful. Thank you. That brings us to the end of the evidence session. I thank the cabinet secretary and her officials for joining us today. We will move on to our next item of business. I suspend the meeting briefly to allow the changeover of witnesses.
10:34 Meeting suspended.10:39 On resuming—
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Subsidy Control Bill
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Claire Baker
I appreciate the tensions and frustrations that have built up around the bill. I asked last week’s witnesses about that, and they suggested that some of the Scottish Government’s requests, such as the ability to veto, would be unworkable and unrealistic. The UK Government would argue that it will take decisions in the best interests of the UK and that it will take Scottish interests into consideration. Do your concerns about that relate to a lack of clarity in the bill? It sounds as though there is distrust of the UK Government in relation to the statements that it has made. Are you seeking assurances that the UK Government will behave in the way that it has outlined when it comes to consideration of devolved Parliaments and nations?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Subsidy Control Bill
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Claire Baker
You have talked about uncertainty because of the lack of guidance. Last week, although it was recognised that the bill could present opportunities for different subsidies within the UK, there was a concern that the uncertainty would lead to risk aversion, particularly in relation to whether public bodies decide to make any investments. Do you recognise those concerns?
Economy and Fair Work Committee (Virtual)
Subsidy Control Bill
Meeting date: 12 January 2022
Claire Baker
Councillor Heddle, mention has been made of local authorities. Under the EU system, would local authorities typically apply for EU subsidies? I understand that such applications would go through the UK Government, but were you engaged in that scheme? Do you see any opportunities in the new model or do you share the concerns that have been expressed?
Economy and Fair Work Committee (Virtual)
Decision on Taking Business in Private
Meeting date: 12 January 2022
Claire Baker
Good morning, and welcome to the first meeting in 2022 of the Economy and Fair Work Committee. Following advice that was issued by parliamentary authorities last month, the meeting will be held virtually.
Our first item of business is a decision on whether to take items 3 and 4 in private. Are members content to take those items in private?
Members indicated agreement.
Economy and Fair Work Committee (Virtual)
Subsidy Control Bill
Meeting date: 12 January 2022
Claire Baker
Thank you. I will now bring in Fiona Hyslop, who will be followed by Alexander Burnett.
10:15Economy and Fair Work Committee (Virtual)
Subsidy Control Bill
Meeting date: 12 January 2022
Claire Baker
Thank you very much, Mr MacDonald.
Finally, Mr Peretz said in an answer that the judgments are quite political. I suppose that this question is, too. We will have the Minister for Business, Trade, Tourism and Enterprise in front of us next week. In recommending that we do not approve the legislative consent motion, the minister has said that the first concern is
“sweeping powers of the Secretary of State, which ignore the devolution settlement and do not grant the equivalent powers to Scottish Government and other devolved Administration Ministers.”
Is that a fair assessment of the bill, given the discussion that we have had this morning? I ask Professor Bell to comment first. One could argue that there is some hyperbolic language in there. If you strip that out, do you agree with the underlying concern that has been expressed by the Scottish Government?
