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 6423 contributions
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Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Housing Inquiry and Budget Scrutiny 2025-26
Meeting date: 14 January 2025
Ariane Burgess
Thank you for that—I might come back on voids a bit later.
I have a final question for now, on local housing emergencies, and then I will bring in Willie Coffey. Minister, in your opening statement, you said that you are taking a regional approach and supporting five local authorities specifically. I asked whether you are monitoring other authorities that might suddenly show up with more severe problems.
We have heard in committee that there is a nuanced approach, and when we went to Argyll and Bute, where we had a wonderful day with the council, we heard that the issue is not just affordable housing but mid-market housing, so the whole system needs to be looked at. I am interested in hearing how the Scottish Government is ensuring that its response to the housing emergency helps all councils with their specific needs and plans, and that good practice is shared among them.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Housing Inquiry and Budget Scrutiny 2025-26
Meeting date: 14 January 2025
Ariane Burgess
Thank you, that is helpful. I will pick up on two of those things and then bring in Willie Coffey. In relation to empty homes, you talked about lessons learned from Glasgow. In the past, when councils have come to the committee, there has been a reluctance around doing that kind of work and I am also aware of that reluctance from my work as an MSP. Since we called an emergency, however, the situation has changed. Have the lessons from Glasgow and other places been learned? For example, Perth and Kinross Council has been exemplary in its work on empty homes and empty properties. Have you been working with councils on that?
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Housing Inquiry and Budget Scrutiny 2025-26
Meeting date: 14 January 2025
Ariane Burgess
That sounds good. It has been good to set the scene and open up the issues around the housing emergency and how you are approaching it.
I will now bring in Willie Coffey on the theme of homelessness.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Housing Inquiry and Budget Scrutiny 2025-26
Meeting date: 14 January 2025
Ariane Burgess
I will just add a footnote on other issues, such as transport and place making. We are trying to move away from thinking about housing as housing to thinking about making places. I am not going to let you respond to that, because I need to move on.
I have a few mopping-up questions to ask. One of the things that comes up in my mind when you talk about empty homes is what you are doing about empty flats above commercial properties that do not seem to make it on to the empty homes list. Are you factoring those in? Single people who live in big homes could move into smaller accommodation, and they might be happy to live in a town centre.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Housing Inquiry and Budget Scrutiny 2025-26
Meeting date: 14 January 2025
Ariane Burgess
Thank you. You might not be able to respond to this, but the idea has come up that, when retrofitting homes and other buildings in Scotland, and for new builds, we could look at locking up carbon, or carbon sequestration, by using timber that has been grown in Scotland. Companies that want to offset their phase 3 emissions could invest in that. The idea that we could get investment for housing while tackling the climate emergency is very interesting. Have you come across that idea and are you doing anything on it?
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Scrutiny of the Scottish Housing Regulator
Meeting date: 17 December 2024
Ariane Burgess
One of you mentioned the three standing forums—for rural and islands, urban, and “systemic impact”, or something like that.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Scrutiny of the Scottish Housing Regulator
Meeting date: 17 December 2024
Ariane Burgess
Thank you, Mark. I now bring in Willie Coffey.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Scrutiny of the Scottish Housing Regulator
Meeting date: 17 December 2024
Ariane Burgess
When we went to visit Argyll and Bute Council and had discussions with it, we heard about the wider issues beyond building supply.
In your opening statement, you mentioned Gypsy Traveller sites. We heard last week that the regulator could be stronger on Gypsy Traveller sites and you said in your opening statement that you are now of the view that the Scottish Government should review the standards for Gypsy Traveller sites. I am interested to hear a bit more about what you think needs to happen and what benefits that might bring, as briefly as possible.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Decision on Taking Business in Private
Meeting date: 17 December 2024
Ariane Burgess
Good morning, and welcome to the 36th meeting in 2024 of the Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee. Mark Griffin is joining us online, and we have received apologies from Meghan Gallacher.
I welcome Evelyn Tweed MSP and Paul Sweeney MSP, both of whom are joining us for our evidence session with the Scottish Housing Regulator.
I remind all members and witnesses to ensure that their devices are on silent.
The first item on our agenda is a decision on taking items 3 to 7 in private. Do members agree to take those items in private?
Members indicated agreement.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee
Scrutiny of the Scottish Housing Regulator
Meeting date: 17 December 2024
Ariane Burgess
Thank you. It was helpful of you to outline the three key areas that you are focused on, which members will certainly want to ask you about.
You will be aware that, this time round, we have taken a deeper-dive approach, not only with your work and your annual report, but with the work of the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman. That approach has been welcomed. There is nothing like getting feedback and other perspectives to understand situations. We have a number of questions based on what we have heard.
Previous witnesses told the committee about their concerns about the Scottish Housing Regulator being
“heavy handed or insufficiently justified”
in some of its decisions. We also heard that there might be a perception of fear of the regulator, especially among smaller RSLs. Do you recognise those concerns? How can you ensure that the SHR is perceived to be an open organisation that can be trusted by everyone?
