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 1270 contributions
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Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
University of Dundee
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
Given the level of cross-subsidy that is required, is the school of life sciences too big for an institution as small as Dundee university?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
University of Dundee
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
The strain is being felt, though, is it not? We hear reports about architecture students who are concerned about whether they will be able to achieve their qualification, because of a lack of resources; we hear staff talking about losses of administrative support putting intolerable pressure on them; and we hear about cleaning services being cut back significantly. How are you measuring how the changes are being felt and whether they are, therefore, critical to the operation of the successful bits of the university and to the success of the university? I get a lot of complaints from people that you do not understand how those departments work and, that, therefore, you do not understand when the changes have gone too far.
11:00Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
University of Dundee
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
That is quite a change from what we were told before, which was that it was believed that a new source of income was going to come within the next two to three years that would prevent the need to go further with job losses. However, you are now saying that you think that the Government now accepts that, for the £62 million, the figure will be above 300, which is what it originally expected.
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Restraint and Seclusion in Schools (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
It will be provided to the university, no matter what happens.
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Restraint and Seclusion in Schools (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
I detect that there is now a much more positive relationship between the SFC, the Government and the university. Do you agree that that is the case?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Restraint and Seclusion in Schools (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
You have stated that you are in support of the bill in principle.
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Restraint and Seclusion in Schools (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
Why are you reluctant to say that it is better? I sense that there is a much more positive relationship now. Why are you reluctant to say that?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Restraint and Seclusion in Schools (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
So, what has changed? You still have not carried out a review and we are still learning from the experience, so why are you now supporting the bill, when you previously opposed it?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
Restraint and Seclusion in Schools (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
Are you saying that you will lodge amendments, rather than leaving it to Mr Johnson to make the bill effective and have the confidence of the Government?
Education, Children and Young People Committee [Draft]
University of Dundee
Meeting date: 29 October 2025
Willie Rennie
I would like to talk about the claims from some that the level of job losses is too severe and too high. You seem to be using two indicators. The first is the staff cost share of total expenditure, which you want to bring closer to the norm for universities in Scotland. The second is the EBITDA—earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation—rates, which you have been saying for a long time are too low and which you want to take up to 10 per cent, but which the UCU Dundee branch says is too severe. Can you set out why you think that the figures of 52 per cent and 10 per cent are right and the UCU is incorrect in its claims?
