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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Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
Professor Kenny, would you like to respond to Karen Adam?
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
That was excellent.
I am afraid to say that I have some nerdy questions. I am going to plump for this one to begin with, given that, at the minute, the committee is reviewing the proxy voting procedure that has been brought in. I am asking this not so much with regard to the gender-sensitive audit but to allow you to contribute to the evidence that we will consider in due course.
You have suggested that proxy voting be extended on the same grounds as remote voting. Would you like to speak to that? After all, it is a big step on from the trial that we have run. One of our early discussions was about the fact that in this iterative Parliament—to pick up on an earlier comment—we have the ability to vote remotely and it is a choice for the individual MSP. Was there a reason for that suggestion? If I am honest, I am not aware of the reasons for extending proxy voting on the same grounds as remote voting.
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
That is fine. I am grateful for that response.
The other part—[Interruption.] Oh—I see that Evelyn Tweed would like to come back in.
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
Excellent. The idea of 40 per cent, a 50-50 split or whatever is—I do not say this in a derogatory way—slightly arbitrary. We actually need to look at the problem that is in front of us, and our solution might be different for each of the issues of gender balance on committees, the gender balance of conveners and gender balance on various other committees. As long as the solutions are moving us iteratively down the road—obviously, subject to what we actually come up with—that would be welcomed as a step in the right direction for the gender audit.
I see that you agree, which is good.
You may be glad to know that I have come to the end of my slightly nerdy questions. Unless any of you would like to make a short final comment, I will close this part of the meeting. Thank you very much for coming. It has been an incredibly interesting dialogue and discussion. Should the committee have other questions, I hope that you will be open to writing to us to submit your thoughts. As always, the clerks are open to discussions in a two-way format to ensure that the committee has the evidence that it needs to make the best decisions. On behalf of the committee, I thank you for your attendance.
10:21 Meeting continued in private until 11:21.Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
Good morning. I welcome everyone to the 17th meeting in 2023 of the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee?. We have received apologies from two committee members—Stephen Kerr and Annie Wells—and Evelyn Tweed will join us remotely.
I welcome back Edward Mountain in a slightly different role, as he is attending as the Scottish Conservatives’ substitute. Before I turn to the first agenda item, I invite Edward first to grant his hellos back to us and, secondly, to put on the record any declaration of registered interests.
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
To pick up on what Evelyn Tweed said about the need for substantial change, there is incredible value in shifting the culture by shifting the smaller rules of the jigsaw without having to rebuild the entire jigsaw at the same time. In the iterative nature of Parliament, those forward steps, although they may seem small and insignificant in their own right, are part of a pathway to something that, on a significant number of occasions, all members and the Presiding Officers have indicated is the goal that we want to achieve.
That is very useful. You mentioned a number of examples of how we could calculate quotas, whether we call them that or something else. Is there value in having different ways of assessing the success of different elements of the proposals in the gender audit? I am acutely aware of our discussion about changes in committee membership, which are frequently driven by understandable Government change. The Government has worked extremely hard to always have a gender balance. In relation to how people view things from the outside, a gender-balanced Government is incredibly important.
Is there value in accepting that change is needed—as, I think, we do—but then having different elements of how we achieve that, depending on the question that is in front of us?
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
We are joined by Karen Adam MSP. Is there anything that you would like to say, Karen? I think it only right that, having been quoted by Evelyn Tweed earlier, you should have the chance to make a rebuttal or ask further questions.
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
I suggest that there is perhaps a difference in Scotland between a constituency MSP, whereby an individual choice could be made, and a list member, whereby it is a political party vote that is extended.
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
“A Parliament for All: Report of the Parliament’s Gender Sensitive Audit”
Meeting date: 26 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
Edward Mountain wants to come in.
Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee
Cross-Party Group on Ukraine
Meeting date: 5 October 2023
Martin Whitfield
Many thanks, Mr Beattie. Unusually, I invite the potential deputy convener, Miles Briggs, to add to that.
