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 2999 contributions
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
Would you say that the resources that you currently have as an organisation are adequate?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
I will move on to lotting. I understand the interaction between the two things, but there is a concern that new owners could just combine land that has been lotted under a ministerial decision. Concern was raised around natural capital projects, with major investors perhaps seeing small parcels of land and deciding to buy them. What is your answer to that concern?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
Thank you.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
However, if good practice has been stuck to, you would not envisage that being part of a compensation claim.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
Do you believe that that issue has been largely resolved or is in the process of being resolved and that a legislative change is therefore not required?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
Yes, I am content to agree to it. We are where we are. However, there is a risk of the regulation having to be brought back again, for the Government to amend the amendment on the basis of there having been another international conversation. It seems like a bit of a waste of time.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
I was struck by your initial comments, Richard, about the big challenges in making sure that there is a climate change plan that delivers for Scotland’s potential role under the proposed natural environment bill and around unanswered questions about environmental governance. However, there is a whole range of other issues as well. You mentioned seal scarers in fish farms, and the whole raft of regulatory reform analysis that Environmental Standards Scotland performs.
How challenging is that landscape at the moment? Week in, week out, I come across demands for reform of regulation and questions about enforcement. Most recently, we heard about the treatment of battery waste at recycling centres, which is an issue that raises questions about whether the regulations are adequate.
In a landscape in which there is such a strong demand for ESS’s services, how do you equip the organisation to deal with the breadth of that demand, to analyse whether regulations are being enforced appropriately and to consider whether they are fit for purpose in the first place?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
I have a final question. The committee has been looking at the bill for quite some time, during which other legislation has been progressing through Parliament, including the Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Act 2024. Is the bill also an opportunity to address some loopholes and issues in other acts that relate to land use? In particular, there are concerns about a loophole in the aforementioned act in relation to the area that is subject to grouse moor licensing. Clearly, some such issues were not foreseen when the bill was drafted. Given that we are in the last year of the parliamentary session, is the cabinet secretary considering whether the bill would be an appropriate vehicle to try and tidy up anything that exists in that space? [Laughter.]
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Meeting date: 18 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
Okay.
Meeting of the Parliament
Meeting date: 6 February 2025
Mark Ruskell
Scottish Greens will back the legislative consent motion at decision time, but I want to sound a note of caution, because we have come through a period in which devolution in Scotland and Wales faced unprecedented attacks from the previous Westminster Government. Intergovernmental ways of working in the UK are still largely based on precedent and good will, rather than being codified in legislation as they are in most other countries that have a devolved context. Ways of working that are based on principles of respect, such as the Sewel convention, have been seriously undermined and contested in recent years to a point where they have become almost meaningless.
In the context of the Great British Energy Bill, I welcome the changes that the Scottish Government has secured to embed a more consultative approach between the Administrations, but there is still a danger of overreach from a future Westminster Government. There will be a role for this Parliament to bring transparency to those relationships, and the convener of the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee made some important points about the role of the committees in that.
When we reflect on the evidence that the committee received, there is clearly a sense that the Labour Government is working more collaboratively with Scottish ministers, which is very welcome. However, despite all the bluster from Anas Sarwar at First Minister’s question time today, when I asked Michael Shanks at committee about the role of GB Energy in promoting nuclear projects, he sounded pretty reasonable. He said:
“Clearly, we have a political difference on nuclear”.
He went on:
“there are no plans and there will be no engagement on that issue, because it is clear that the Scottish Government would block those applications.
That is the legitimate position that the Scottish Government has taken on that planning matter, and I do not think that there is a confrontation or a conflict on that.”—[Official Report, Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee, 21 January 2025; c 53.]
That was real clarity—no new nuclear in Scotland. That is what Labour head office says, and that is probably the best news that Labour back benchers have had all week.
However, Stephen Kerr raised a valid question, because it is still not really clear what GB Energy will do in Scotland, how many jobs it will create and how long it will take to do that. I take on board Sarah Boyack’s point that it is early days, but I note for clarity that there is a huge record of success in the development of renewable energy in Scotland, which is bringing down bills and keeping the lights on across the UK. For example, the onshore wind sector deal, which the Greens were proud to work on with SNP ministers during our time in government, is now starting to help to double the generation capacity from onshore wind in Scotland by 2030. With that will come opportunities for community benefit and community ownership, and that is real energy security.