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 972 contributions
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
Thank you for that, Mr Shanks. You said that you are looking to review the system. Is the current model of service sustainable?
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
You said that you were looking at the service. How far down the line are you on that, and how deeply are you reviewing the service with the aim of changing it?
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
I wonder whether we should write to the Scottish Government. It will be running a health awareness messaging campaign on social media later this year, and given the fact that Covid has been brought into the matter, perhaps it can be put into that social media campaign.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
I think that Jackie Baillie wants to say something.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
I have been caught in diversions several times, especially when going to the Harley-Davidson rally. I have had to wait for six hours. In some communities, people would not travel if they had to wait a lengthy time in diversions, especially to places such as Aviemore for skiing, given that that there are alternative ski resorts in the area, off the A9. A long delay—
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
I put on record that I am somebody who knows the A9 well and has been to the Moy fair for the past 25 years—Fergus will probably testify to seeing me there.
Your first option, which is the quickest way to do it, is to break the road down into three sections. How much would that disrupt the tourism industry? Would it cut it off for a long time in the area?
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
Just to put on record, those communities around there and a lot of the holiday towns—Aviemore and such places—would be devastated, would they not?
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
If someone has road tax for their vehicle, whether or not it is a camper van, they are allowed to park it anywhere, as long as it is not causing an obstruction to a road or driveway. Therefore, under rule 15.7 of standing orders, I am happy to close the petition—
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
Convener, I am quite happy to close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders—[Laughter.]—if any other committee members wish to back me.
Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Meeting date: 14 June 2023
David Torrance
I know that it is to do with contracts, but how difficult is it to get the workforce there and get accommodation for it? From speaking to people who stay in the area in which I am, I know that winter rates are cheap and that the communities rely on tourists in the summer. Therefore, workers were moved off the A9 and away and found it very difficult to get accommodation—they were having to travel. Having to travel huge distances to get to those sections is not an attractive prospect for anybody who is employed in that industry.