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 977 contributions
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
My question is probably for Dr Bruce. Trauma-informed care is obviously an issue across the justice system, but I know that Dr Bruce has said that more of her work is associated with victims and witnesses. You have already said that the way that the prosecution takes evidence from a witness can have a big impact on the quality of the evidence that is given. Could you expand on that? What implications does that have for cross-examination by the defence? Witness preparation is not a major feature of our justice system. From the work that you have done with people who work with victims and witnesses, do you have any comments on issues that arise?
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
Are you saying that sheriffs and others do not make community-based disposals because they think that the offender will not comply with them?
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
I am interested in the issue of cross-examination, and not just the Crown taking evidence from a witness. It is a major issue for the complainers and for witnesses. What issues arise from your work in relation to how the courts deal with that?
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
Yes, please.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
We are short of time, and it is a question about defence agents. You have explained in great detail what your organisation does, but the other side of it is the defence agents. If you do not feel that you can respond or it is not politic for you to respond—
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
We are talking about all criminal cases. Would you look at that in the context of all criminal cases and your extensive experience?
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
Is there trauma-informed training now for all those who sit in judgment in criminal courts, whether that is a justice of the peace court or any other? Could you provide a brief answer on that?
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
I know that, yes, but we do not have them here and you might be the nearest person who has an understanding. [Laughter.]
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
Thank you very much.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 1 November 2023
Katy Clark
Are you saying that the Scottish Government needs to put its money where its mouth is?