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 4037 contributions
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Finance and Public Administration Committee
Aggregates Tax and Devolved Taxes Administration (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 5 March 2024
Kenneth Gibson
Mr Doak, in paragraph 16 of your submission, you say:
“English producers may be keen to exploit any substantial increase in rates in Scotland.”
That depends on what you mean by “substantial”. What would you describe as “substantial”?
My understanding is that the Scottish Government does not intend to do this, but what if, for example, it decided to increase the rate from £2.03 per tonne, which is what it will be from April, to £3 per tonne? Given the cost of shipping or trucking aggregates, would an increase of £1 per tonne really mean that people would be shipping vast quantities of aggregates into Scotland? I would have thought that the cost of the shipments would be much higher than £1 per tonne once the fuel, the lorry driver and so on had been paid for. There are also not many highly populated areas near the border between Scotland and England; most of the cities that would use the aggregate are further south.
Therefore, would such an increase have a real impact? In other words, what is the elasticity of demand? Conversely, if the Scottish Government reduced the tax to £1 per tonne, would there suddenly be huge demand for Scottish aggregates in England? That seems a bit unrealistic—we are talking about £1 per tonne. I am struggling to see how changing the rate in either direction would have a major impact.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 5 March 2024
Kenneth Gibson
Private companies and local authorities are very responsible in how they deal with waste; they follow the regulations that apply. Have there been any prosecutions of unlicensed and unregulated dumpers?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 5 March 2024
Kenneth Gibson
Okay; I appreciate that.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Aggregates Tax and Devolved Taxes Administration (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 5 March 2024
Kenneth Gibson
Thank you. Incidentally, Gillian Mackay has had to leave to attend a meeting of the Parliamentary Bureau. She gives her apologies.
I have one further question for you, Mr Doak, before I open up the discussion to colleagues round the table. In the first paragraph of your written submission, you say:
“Extraction of ... aggregates in Scotland as in the rest of the UK is well-managed and heavily regulated. The industry has a strong environmental track record”.
I think that we recognise that. However, concerns have been raised about unregulated quarriers and so on. How big a problem or issue is that? Would you like the bill to tackle that?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2024-25
Meeting date: 20 February 2024
Kenneth Gibson
That would be very welcome, and the sooner it could be introduced, the better.
Enterprise is obviously an issue. If one were to read the response without actually looking at the budget, one would think that everything was pretty hunky-dory in terms of the Government prioritising enterprise. However, what is said in the response is not really reflected in the budget figures. For example, in response to paragraph 102, you said:
“we have prioritised funding for the enterprise agencies to the extent possible given the extremely challenging settlement.”
You said “to the extent possible”, but I am looking at a 15 per cent reduction, which is pretty harsh. If we look at the overall settlement, the Scottish Government’s budget has not been reduced by that. The committee is of the view that we need a widening and growing tax base, which you refer to in other areas of your report. It seems to me and colleagues that 15 per cent is a pretty severe cut at such a time.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2024-25
Meeting date: 20 February 2024
Kenneth Gibson
Thank you for that.
In paragraph 95 of our report, we raised concerns about the affordability and sustainability of the social security budget, which is growing inexorably. I am not making any comment as to whether that is a good thing or a bad thing; I am just looking at the finances. One thing leapt out at me in your response. You said that
“the Scottish Government will ensure that there is budget cover within the overall Scottish Budget envelope”
to cover social security. Is the Government saying that the social security budget is sacrosanct in that, regardless of how demand grows—or reduces—the Scottish Government will meet it?
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2024-25
Meeting date: 20 February 2024
Kenneth Gibson
I will move on, because colleagues want to come in. In paragraph 144 of our report, we requested
“an update on when the Scottish Government will seek to schedule a parliamentary debate”
on the long-term sustainability of Scotland’s finances. The response says:
“The Scottish Government continues to support a debate ... on the long-term sustainability of Scotland’s finances as confirmed by the Deputy First Minister on 3 October 2023.”
That was five months ago, but we still do not have a scheduled date.
Let us be honest—some of the debates that we have had in the chamber have not exactly been thrillers. I have been in the chamber many times when the Presiding Officer has said, “I will allow the member a very generous six minutes,” because there is no great enthusiasm to speak. Debates that could last an hour are being extended to two hours and 20 minutes or whatever, whereas debates such as the one that we have requested, which are important, are not being scheduled.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2024-25
Meeting date: 20 February 2024
Kenneth Gibson
There is a lot more to cover, but we have a full house, so I will open up the discussion to colleagues.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget (Scotland) (No 3) Bill: Stage 2
Meeting date: 20 February 2024
Kenneth Gibson
Our second agenda item is to consider the Budget (Scotland) (No 3) Bill at stage 2. There are no amendments but, under standing orders, we are obliged to consider each section and schedule of the bill and the long title and to agree to each formally.
We will take the sections in order, with schedules being taken immediately after the section that introduces them and the long title last. Fortunately, standing orders allow us to put a single question where groups of sections or schedules are to be considered consecutively and, unless members disagree, that is what I propose to do.
Section 1 agreed to.
Schedule 1 agreed to.
Section 2 agreed to.
Schedule 2 agreed to.
Section 3 agreed to.
Schedule 3 agreed to.
Sections 4 to 11 agreed to.
Long title agreed to.
Finance and Public Administration Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2024-25
Meeting date: 20 February 2024
Kenneth Gibson
Welcome to the eighth meeting in 2024 of the Finance and Public Administration Committee. We will consider the Budget (Scotland) (No 3) Bill at stage 2 today. However, before moving to our formal proceedings, we will take evidence on the Scottish Government’s response to the committee’s report “Budget Scrutiny 2024-25”.
We are joined by Shona Robison, the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Finance. The cabinet secretary is accompanied by Scottish Government officials Dr Alison Cumming, who is the director for budget and public spending; Ian Storrie, who is the head of local government finance; and Lorraine King, who is the deputy director of the tax and revenues directorate. I welcome our witnesses to the meeting.
Last Friday, members received copies of the Scottish Government’s response to our report. Before we move to questions from the committee, I invite the cabinet secretary to make a short opening statement.
