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 1268 contributions
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Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 17 May 2022
Miles Briggs
I heard what the cabinet secretary had to say, and the minister has repeated it today, but I would point out that a lot of progress has been made in Wales on things on which we have not really seen work begin—and I am thinking specifically of the Welsh Government’s proposals for buying out owners. There just seems to be an issue with progress in Scotland compared with that in Wales, even though the same devolved powers are available.
Finally, would the Scottish Government consider underwriting professional indemnity insurance for surveyors and fire safety assessors?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Low Income and Debt Inquiry
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Miles Briggs
Good morning. I thank the witnesses for joining us. I will continue the line of questioning on access to services. How has the delivery of your services changed between the start of the pandemic and now? Were you able to continue face-to-face meetings with clients? Perhaps Sarah-Jayne Dunn can answer first.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Low Income and Debt Inquiry
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Miles Briggs
You touched on this in your responses, but what have you learned during the pandemic about new models? When I visited the citizens advice bureau in Leith, we talked about how partnerships are being developed with banks to look at early intervention to help support people. What have you learned that you have carried on doing? You said that access to support is different, such as through a phone line service. Is there anything else that we may need to know about early intervention schemes specifically?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Low Income and Debt Inquiry
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Miles Briggs
To link into that point, we heard in the earlier evidence session about the ask around training and advice referrals in mental health services. Do current mental health and suicide prevention strategies adequately consider the role that financial difficulties can play, and how would you like to see that change?
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Low Income and Debt Inquiry
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Miles Briggs
I will start with Rebecca Stacey, because I can see her on the screen.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Low Income and Debt Inquiry
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Miles Briggs
I will ask a few questions about debt and suicide. In relation to the Money and Mental Health Policy Institute’s research in 2018, what reassessment has taken place of the scale of the problem of suicide and debt? I will bring in Rebecca Stacey first, then anyone else can comment if they want to.
Social Justice and Social Security Committee
Low Income and Debt Inquiry
Meeting date: 12 May 2022
Miles Briggs
My question is about access to help and support, and early intervention. From the witnesses’ experiences, what scope is there to identify people earlier and provide them with a referral? That might not necessarily be in a mental health context; it might relate to other organisations that might be in contact with individuals who are financially vulnerable.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 10 May 2022
Miles Briggs
Thanks for that.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 10 May 2022
Miles Briggs
A number of external building elements are specifically excluded from the requirement to use non-combustible materials—examples of that are doors, windows and glazing. Are the witnesses satisfied that those exemptions will not potentially compromise fire safety? If not, what changes would you like to see made to the regulations?
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 10 May 2022
Miles Briggs
Good morning, and thank you for joining us in the meeting room and online.
I will continue the line of questioning about the regulation preventing the use of
“highly combustible metal composite material”
in external cladding and insulation. Is the definition in the regulations robust enough to ensure that any dangers that are posed by such material have now been reduced as far as is reasonably practicable? Are there other things that we need to look at specifically in terms of metal composite material? Peter—you touched on that, so I will start with you.
