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 1878 contributions
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Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
Mr Brogan might have crystallised the issue. It is all about moving away from the question whether we are on track with our five-year carbon budgets because, ultimately, that issue will take care of itself when we report on them. Instead, we need to drill down much more carefully, because our milestones will be our specific sectoral targets for construction, for decarbonising heat networks, for transport and so on. We need to drill down into delivery for each of those sectors, and the Parliament can play much more of a role in scrutinising that as part of the climate change plan.
In the past, we have had this high-level stuff about whether we are meeting targets, but the fact is that we can meet targets and still not be on track, because we have not done the hard miles to do the things that have to be delivered, say, nine, 10 or 11 years out. We need to look much more at the sectoral milestones, which will involve the climate change plan, not the five-year carbon budgets. Have I got that right, Mr Brogan?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
I will stick with the deputy convener’s line of questioning and flip my questions around. My first question, which again is probably for Cornilius Chikwama, is about how we monitor and report on all this. There have been concerns that the bill may lead to a dilution in the approach to reporting. My understanding is that, under the existing legislation, annual reporting mechanisms will endure despite the changes in the bill. The Climate Change Committee has suggested reporting twice within the five-year cycle. Has the Government got the balance right in the reporting mechanisms in the bill?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
Before I bring in Jamie Brogan, do you want to add anything to that? I imagine that, if the bill is passed, Audit Scotland will have to do some monitoring on the issue. Taking into account what the deputy convener said about the need to be explicit on whether the Scottish Government’s progress has been blown off track because of, say, a shock to its capital budget as a result of decisions by Westminster or other unforeseen events, is Audit Scotland content with the provisions for reporting and monitoring mechanisms in the legislation as it stands?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
What the committee may be establishing is that this is not about the five-year budgets but about getting the delivery plan in place and how we monitor that to hold Government and other agencies to account. We are considering enabling legislation, so I wanted to check that there is nothing inherent in the bill that would seek to dilute any commitment to a just transition or to climate justice.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
Could that be mitigated by the annual reporting under proposed section 34A of the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009? If that reporting made explicit reference to how any of this has impacted on a just transition or climate justice, would that give a degree of reassurance? Should that provision be explicit that that is to be part of the annual reporting commitment?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
I suppose that it is a question for the local authorities. I was trying to roll it all into one question—thank you for your generosity, convener, in allowing me back in. No one is aware of any challenges that non-alignment has caused Wales; it was important for the committee to hear that.
Do any of the local authorities have any issues such as the one that Glasgow has raised about
“differing sources of data to calculate emissions”
making it challenging to align the budgets? I have no idea whether that is robust evidence or not, but it is evidence that the committee has received. Have local authorities considered any challenges in relation to aligning with the five-year budgets at UK level?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
I will make that point in private as well, convener.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
Okay.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
Thank you. I understand it now, convener.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 24 September 2024
Bob Doris
I understand that the bill that we are scrutinising is framework legislation and that further details will come in secondary legislation. However, would you change any specific aspects of reporting and monitoring?
