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 1411 contributions
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Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
I will turn to the veterinary course, which I know you are particularly proud of alongside the degree-awarding powers that you have for the institution.
There is concern in the British Veterinary Association about the support that is provided for veterinary courses at the main institutions—the traditional places where they are taught. There is the belief that the level of support that is provided is not enough to fund the courses, which is why those institutions rely so much on international students. International students can make up to half of the student complement—in fact, in Edinburgh, it is over half of the student complement—for that qualification.
You do not have that chance; you have few international students. I know that you are seeking to grow that, but it is currently 1 per cent of the total number of students at the institution. Where is the money coming from to fund the course? Is it funded completely from the students, or is additional funding coming from elsewhere in the institution?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
So there is no cross-subsidy: you are not taking money from elsewhere to fund the veterinary courses. There is no cross-subsidy from elsewhere.
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
Okay. I have one final question, convener, if that is okay. What lessons have you learned from the episode with the animal care unit closure about how you handled it and the decisions that you reached?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
There is no doubt Fife College was reckless 10 years ago when it pulled out and left you with a large building that was half empty—I get that. It was the drift for years that was frustrating for many people in the community, when all they saw was cut after cut and no plan for the future.
I am pleased now that we have Sir Ian Boyd, and I want to ask you a few more questions about his work in a minute. However, the issue for me is that it looks like the SRUC is more interested in the cities—Aberdeen, Inverness and Edinburgh—than it is in, say, Oatridge, where we have heard stories about the poor quality of student accommodation, or in Barony, where people feel left out. Auchincruive was sold off some years ago, and now Elmwood is facing that, too.
It looks as if you are more interested in grand projects in the cities than in the regional commitment, particularly in further education in places like Elmwood, Oatridge and elsewhere. Can you assure me that we have turned a corner and that you are committed to a true regional-based policy, not just to the cities?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
Is funding provided by the Scottish Funding Council for the qualification sufficient to run the course?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
So you do not see the need to significantly increase the number of international students to make the course a success.
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
Okay. You are very animated about degree qualifications, about the degree-awarding powers, about the veterinary course, and about the HE provision. I do not see you animated as much about the further education provision.
Staff feel that and they see it. They see how, when you speak, you speak passionately about all those things at the upper levels, as they would see it, whereas they feel left behind. Despite what you say about the proportion or the split between FE and HE, they feel as if you do not care about FE as much as you care about other levels.
Tell me why that is the wrong perception and what you are doing to make sure that SRUC seems a rounded institution that values all of its parts.
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
Do you regret how it was all handled and the damage that it has clearly done to a lot of young people who saw the animal care unit as a lifeline? I have met many of the students and you have met them, too. They relied on that unit to give them a chance and you have taken that away from them. Do you regret that decision, the handling of it, and the impact on those young people?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Scotland’s Rural College
Meeting date: 14 January 2026
Willie Rennie
Okay. I think that they will disagree. I worry about those people and others in the community who will have to travel long distances to get a similar opportunity. I worry about them, but I have said enough, convener.
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 7 January 2026
Willie Rennie
I thank the minister for that update. Will she tell us the current number of cross-border placements from England? Has the number gone up and down? If so, what are the reasons for that?
