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 3156 contributions
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Meeting date: 11 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
One thing that the Government has committed to and which is very welcome is a trial introduction of capped bus fares. Will the Government consider how that works with free bus travel, to help people who have reached the age of 22 and therefore no longer get free travel? How will the pilot’s findings feed into wider consideration of how we make more travel free and affordable?
Meeting of the Parliament [Draft]
Meeting date: 10 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
I want to make a couple of brief comments in relation to the LCM. At the outset, it is deeply disappointing that the LCM has come to the chamber without any proper scrutiny at all. It appears that these expedited LCMs are becoming part of routine practice. Every time that this happens, it undermines the Parliament while strengthening the executive power of the Scottish Government and the Westminster Government.
From what I understand, Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill wants to simplify the bus franchising process in England; his bill now includes a provision to end the procurement of fossil fuel buses no earlier than 2030; he wishes to extend this power to Scottish ministers; and the Scottish Government has worked with the UK Government on an amendment to achieve that.
That is all fine, and I agree with many of the comments about bus policy that were just made by Paul Sweeney. However, I cannot genuinely reflect in this debate on the views of Scottish bus operators and manufacturers about the provision, and I cannot say in this debate whether 2030 is too late or too soon. The reason why I cannot do that is that there has been zero scrutiny by a committee. I also cannot reflect on whether there were other opportunities through this UK bill to, for example, expedite the simplification of the bus franchising process in Scotland or any other related issues—again, because there has been no scrutiny.
The Scottish Greens will be voting for this LCM, but I have to say that patience is wearing very thin. I hope that the Conveners Group can discuss this recurring issue of expedited LCMs, and that the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee can continue to reflect on the continued unravelling of parliamentary protocol in this Parliament.
17:22Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
I am reading the submission from the Institute for Public Policy Research in Scotland. It says that MSPs will have to decide to approve the carbon budgets
“effectively in ignorance of the policies they would then have to support in order to see the budgets delivered.”
The lack of information is concerning, and it perhaps plays to those, such as Mr Lumsden, who want to weaken ambition for the carbon budget, rather than people such as me, who want to strengthen that ambition.
No climate change plan—not even a draft one—has been submitted. We have only an incredibly thin indicative statement. The Government has rejected the advice of the UK Climate Change Committee on livestock and on peatlands, and policies on heat and on traffic reduction have been dropped. There is no energy strategy as yet. When it comes to Peterhead power station, there is uncertainty about the existing power station, let alone the prospect of a second one.
There are a lot of unknowns here and, quite frankly, I do not know whether this carbon budget is ambitious enough, because it lacks the transparency that successive committees of this Parliament have called for in advance of setting targets, objectives and aspirations around climate change. Although I will not vote against the budget, I find it very difficult to vote for it, because, without that detail, I do not know what it is that we are voting on at this point. I will therefore abstain.
12:30Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
Thank you. Gabi, would you like to come in?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
Are there any other thoughts on that from the panel?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
Should we be measuring, for example, the carbon impacts of dredging and trawling on the inshore? Is that the kind of approach that we should look at in Scotland? We do not have mangrove forests, but we have seabeds.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
Is that correct?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
Are you open to listening to what the air-source heat pump sector is saying about the cost of electricity and the effectiveness of its technology? I see a huge amount of misinformation and lobbying around the heat in buildings bill to, in effect, portray air-source heat pumps as being highly expensive, particularly in the context of the electricity bills that many households face, but that does not match the reality of the technology that is being installed in Scotland.
If the sector comes to you and says, “There are some assumptions in your climate change plan and in the heat in buildings bill that are not right. We think that we can go further with the technology that we have”—
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
We have the industry coming into Parliament tomorrow to talk to MSPs about the misinformation that is out there. I am concerned that that has perhaps influenced Government policy in a way that has led you to reject the advice not only of your officials, initially, but of the UK Climate Change Committee.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee [Draft]
Meeting date: 9 September 2025
Mark Ruskell
No, I think that we can just move on.